COPE Method Implementation Program to Reduce Communication Apprehension Level in Full Day Yunior High School Students

This study was aimed to explore the effect of COPE method to reduce communication apprehension level of students in Early Adolescence who become Full Day Junior High School students. Full Day Junior High School students, especially in Surabaya coastal area, have more demands to develop the communication aspects such as group discussions and presentations and extracurricular activities. Higher demands to develop such aspects of communication may cause them to experience communication apprehension. The subject was Full Day School students totaling 31 students. The design of the research was experimental design. The experimental method used was a non-randomized pretest posttest control group design and purposive sampling was also used. COPE method is a process that consists of four main stages where people are trying to deal with and control of stressful situations as a result of the problem being faced by conducting cognitive and behavioral changes. Four main stages COPE method is Calming the nervous system, Originating an imaginative plan, Persisting in the face of obstacles and failure, and Evaluating and adjusting the plan. Results of quantitative analysis based on U-Mann Whitney Test shows significant effect on the COPE Method to decrease anxiety levels of communication (0.000 <0.005).


Introduction
Almost 70% of Indonesian territory consists of ocean which results in various maritime potentials. Indonesian maritime territory consists of 5,8 million square of coastal areas, territorial sea, and exclusive economic zone. The coastal line stretches along 81.000 kilometers [1]. Coastal and marine areas are part of our environment that has great potential in providing living space and living resources. These marine potentials of course, need to be addressed in comprehensive human resources as well. The structure of people living in coastal areas has high potential of social vulnerability which is caused by two things; First, those people have the issue of low income level or poverty and limited job opportunity and second, people living in coastal area are outspoken and temperamental [2]. Based on those backgrounds, one of human resources that need to be handled carefully is adolescents living in coastal area. Adolescents as social beings have always interacted to parents and all of their life is spend to adapt to their environment due to changing life situations. Early adolescents (age 12-14 years old) have several social needs for their existence of self-development which is related to social skills like sosiogenic need, need for novel experience, need for physical and social adequacy, need for status, and security need [3]. Sosiogenic need includes group acceptance, social and personal identification, and participation. Group and peer acceptance is important during early adolescence. Early adolescents usually put their priority to their group rather than to their family. Early adolescents who prioritize group acceptance are considered normal as long as the group conduct positive activities and do not harm others. To develop and fulfill sosiogenic need, early adolescents should be introduced to their environment as early as possible. Early introduction to environment is beneficial for them so they will be able to acknowledge bigger social environment besides their parents, relatives, and grandparents. Need for novel experience is related to early adolescents' desire to gain experience and enjoy fun activities. They are interested to join various groups to exchange information about new and interesting things. They also have the desire to be accepted by their reference group (need for physical and social adequacy). Early adolescents who lack of social skills and are not accepted by their group will experience anxiety, inferiority feelings, low self esteem and gradually suffer shyness of withdrawn. Need for status in early adolescents is related to the desire to be recognized by family, peers, school and community. Security need is the strongest motivation in early adolescents which is related to social status, power and worth, self-confident, and moral integrity. Those aspects are important for early adolescents since they often experience confusion or ambivalences like the desire to be independent or dependent to others, selfishness or altruism, individuality or conformity. They will be in conflict if they cannot solve their confusion or ambivalences so they will feel less confidence to their competence and at the end, will have negative self-concept.
Social needs of early adolescents are in line with one of their tasks namely developing interpersonal communication skills and practice to get acquaintance with their peers and others, in terms of individual interactions or group interactions [3]. Early adolescents who are less confident in performing interpersonal communication will experience communication apprehension [4]. Jalaluddin Rakhmad [4] states that the reasons why individuals experience communications anxiety are: first, they do not know what to do; second, they know that they will be assessed; third, they are faced to unfamiliar situation and they feel unprepared.
Burgoon and Ruffner [5] mention the characteristics of communication apprehension which consist of Unwillingness to communicate, Avoiding or rejection to participate and Control or lack of control to communication situation. Individuals who experience communication apprehension will withdraw themselves from association, afraid that others will be mocking him and blame him, speak haltingly during speech, only say something if forced to do so, often choose irrelevant topics because relevant topics usually attract others' responses and lead to longer speech. [5]. Communication skills are essential for early adolescents because they should start to get acquainted with peers, teachers, people surrounding their house, and others. They also have to develop communication skills related to school assignments and activities like discussion, presentation, and art exhibition [4]. Early adolescents who suffer from impaired communication apprehension will lead to shyness or social anxiety [6] which defines as the fear of being unaccepted by their group. Early adolescents who suffer from shyness or social anxiety tend to avoid others, easily get scared, skeptical, reserved and reluctant to talk to others, even early adolescents do not have the initiative in social situations, tend to talk quietly, avoid eye contact and less able to communicate. If the communication apprehension remains untreated, those adolescents will face difficulties in completing next developmental tasks when they continue their study and have a job. In a study conducted by Rahayu et al [7], it was observed that 45,56% of college students suffer from high communication apprehension. In another study conducted by Suwandi [8] in Sanata Darma University, it was observed that 48,3% of the students experience high communication apprehension. Communication apprehension experienced by early adolescents should be treated so that it will not affect next developmental tasks. Therefore, by conducting this study, researcher was interested in applying COPE method to lower communication apprehension in early adolescents studying in Full Day Junior High School which is located in West Surabaya which is also a coastal area. Early adolescents studying in Full Day Junior High School are required to develop their communication aspects by having longer study-time at school which is based on educational program having the purpose to develop communication aspects like group discussion and class presentation as well as extracurricular activity. Their communication skills should be ready to be applied not only in schools but also in community to create better public relations since education is an effort to make students realize their role as part of the environment. Education also has a role to establish the social value of adolescents to conform to the value of adults as well as to develop social skills and social competence.
COPE method was introduced by Dacey & Ficore [9] which explains that 90% of children and adolescent suffering from anxiety can be treated using that method (2000). COPE method is a process which consists of four main phase where individuals attempt to handle stressful situations as a result of their problems by applying cognitive and behavioral changes to feel comfortable [4]. Those four phases in COPE method are "Can COPE method be applied to lower communication apprehension of Full Day School Students?". The objective of the study was assessing hypothesis that COPE method can be applied to lower communication apprehension of Full Day School Students.

Method
The independent variable in the study was COPE Method and communication apprehension acted as dependent variable. Purposive sampling was used as sample collection technique to take sample based on particular considerations. In the study, 31 out of 42 research subject from 7 th grade students in Full Day Nur Hidayah Junior High School ware selected as sample. Those subjects were selected based on low, medium, high, and very high anxiety score. Two groups were then formed from a total of 31 students which consist of 15 students act as experimental group and 16 students in control group.
The study used quasi experimental design which adapted nonrandomized pretest-posttest control group design consisting experimental and control group. Experimental group was treated with COPE method while no intervention applied to control group as the comparative group. The intervention given to experimental group is the implementation of COPE Method given for 4 days using the duration of 3 hours per day. COPE Method is a process which consists of four main phases where individuals attempting to handle and manage stressful situations by making cognitive or behavioral changes to overcome communication apprehension and increase self-control by cognitive orientation [9]. Those four main phases are:  C = Calming the nervous system. In this phase, students experiencing communication apprehension are guided to acknowledge the reaction of the anxiety by calming them down and feeling comfortable in facing their problems. Students try to think clearly about what has happened, say what they feel and feel the difference when they feel anxious and when they feel relaxed.
 O = Originating an imaginative plan.
In this phase, when individuals have calmed down, students are directed to think creatively and find an insight about the reason of their anxiety and identifying their strengths and weaknesses.
 P = Persisting in the face of obstacle and failure. During this phase, students are motivated to strive and accept their failure and obstacles so that they will be stronger in facing any situations. Students are also taught and supported to have positive thinking and willing to solve their problems.
 E = Evaluating and adjusting the plan.
In this phase, therapist and students are making plans for their problem solutions and making evaluation about their plan. Therapist should provide support, persuasion and feedback for clients to make students believe in their ways in solving problems.
COPE Method were designed based on method stated by Dacey & Ficore [9] which includes role play of special technique application, lecture, group discussion on problems experienced by participants, homework and feedback and reinforcement from facilitator. Those methods can be described as follows: a. Role Play Role play is important to provide particular situations for participants. In this training, role play is applied at the beginning of the training by creating a fun situation so that participants are able to having fun by laughing together and at the end of training, a relaxation session is applied. The practice was done so participants are able to study the techniques and apply them when having stressful situations. b. Lecture Lecture is a face to face activity involving communication between trainer and participants. The purpose is conveying information about knowledge, opinion or new approach to the participants. During this activity, participants are expected to digest the information conveyed by the trainer and respond to that information. c. Feedback and Reinforcement Feedback and reinforcement are applied to reflect story shared by participants in group discussion during the training. Participants receive inputs, comments, and reinforcements for their feeling, attitude and behavior conducted when experiencing stress at work. Based on the feedback, participants should be able to establish proper behavior. d. Homework Homework is given to monitor personal behavior. The purpose is to strengthen process applied in the previous session. e. Group discussion In group discussion, participants review all their problems, analyze, and making simple conclusion from their own problem. The purpose of this training is to give opportunities to participants to apply various skills needed in particular situations.
Measurement tools used in this study was communication apprehension scale which has reliability value (rxx) as much as 0.9012. The scale was created based on the theory stated by Burgoon [5]: 1. Unwillingness or individual unwillingness to participate in communication, which is characterized by: a. Showing high anxiety reaction which results in unwillingness to communicate, like anxiety in starting communication, group discussion or presentation in front of the class. b. The tendency to stay away from others which is characterized by low participation in the communication situation by remaining silent and sowing little talk or participation in communication c. Avoidance of participation in communication by avoiding to talk, to participate in group discussions and presentation to the class, and delegating presentation task to others.. d. The perception of not accepted by others by feeling that his/her opinion is not accepted, cornered, thinking that others are not enthusiastic, lost others' trust, and unwanted. e. Feeling unconfident to talk directly with others, afraid to talk with people who are smarter or have a certain authority, afraid not being able to present yourself well, afraid making mistake 2. Lack of control to communication situations which is characterized by: a. Inability to adapt to the environment, whether its supply, room or the communication atmosphere which is rowdy or crowded, formal, non-formal and unfamiliar or unobserved.
b. Inability to adapt to others which consists of inability to adapt in public, inability to adapt to wishes and requirements from others, inability to start communication with strangers, friends from other classes and seniors. c. Inability to adapt to unpleasant reactions from conversation partner like receiving many challenging questions, unpleasant comments and unsupported responses.

Result and Discussion
The study used Mann Whitney U-Test data analysis. The result of Mann Whitney U-Test data analysis to observe COPE method implementation to reduce communication apprehension can be seen in the following Table 1 and 2: a Grouping Variable: group U-Test calculation on posttest data of experimental and control group shows that calculated p value based on z statistics is 0,000. The calculated p value based on z statistics is lower than significance level (p) which is measured at 0,05 which means that posttest data of experimental and control group is significantly different. It explains that the hypothesis of the study (Ha) is accepted, or there is a significant result from COPE method implementation to reduce communication apprehension in students in early adolescence studying in Full Day Junior High School. The difference of sum of rank (in U-Test data) of communication apprehension posttest data score of experimental and control group also shows significant difference compared to sum of rank of communication apprehension pretest data score of experimental and control group. Besides quantitative analysis, the study presents another supporting data which were obtained from each subject per stage during the process of COPE method, which is summarized in the table below:

Originating an imaginative plan
Subject feels anxious when the information is not clear.

Persisting in the face of obstacle and failure
Subject experiences communication apprehension: -Getting unfamiliar communication task -Getting little information to complete the task 4. Evaluating and adjusting the plan Practicing to speak fluently and feel relaxed when starting conversation with others and receiving a call from someone else, trying to be relax when seeing the Headmaster and studying how to convey opinion, practicing hard when appointed as the officer of the ceremony, conducting presentation in front of the class and joining competition.

Calming the nervous system
Pleasant Situation: feels happy and comfortable Unpleasant Situation: feels afraid and stressed 2. Originating an imaginative plan Subject feels anxious: -Faced to first time experience -When undergoes frightening situation, subject has negative thoughts that may occur when facing the situation.

Persisting in the face of obstacle and failure
Subject feels anxious: -Faced to first time experience -When undergoes frightening situation, subject has negative thoughts that may occur when facing the situation. 4. Evaluating and adjusting the plan Solution from subject: making preparation and constructing positive thoughts that subject is able to present in front of the class, perform well when appointed as the officer of the ceremony, seeing nice people in school and being able to join competition well.

4
1. Calming the nervous system Pleasant Situation: feels happy Unpleasant Situation: feels afraid, nervous, worried and trembling 2. Originating an imaginative plan Subject feels anxious when faced to first time experience, frightening situation and subject has negative thoughts about the situation.

Persisting in the face of obstacle and failure
Subject feels anxious: -Faced to first time experience -When undergoes frightening situation, subject has negative thoughts that may occur when facing the situation. the qualitative analysis according to the main objective of COPE method which is changing the cognitive thought of each subject in the experimental group to be more positive and gaining skills to solve problems needs further treatment. For further research, it is necessary to pay attention to the process of COPE method implementation. Future studies are necessary to monitor and do in depth exploration about the reaction of both physiological and psychological anxiety experienced by the subject. Researchers also need to conduct a review or repetition of the previous material to students. The process is intended to provide a review to the students about the previous process on an ongoing basis so that students can really benefit from COPE method.