The effectiveness of imago therapy training on cognitiveflexibility and cognitive avoidance of mothers with mentallyretarded children

The aim of this research was the effectiveness of imago therapy training oncognitive flexibility and cognitive avoidance of mothers with mentally retarded children.

The method of this research was semi-experimental and was carried out usinga pre-test-post-test design with a control group. The statistical community consisted of all mothers withmentally retarded children in Birjand city in 2022-2023. 28 mothers of intellectually disabled children wereselected from among the statistical population using the available sampling method, and they were randomlyreplaced in the form of two experimental (14) and control (14) groups. In this research, in order to collectresearch data, cognitive flexibility questionnaire by Dennis and Vanderwaal (2010) and cognitive avoidanceby Sexton and Dagas (2008) were used. The experimental group underwent imagotherapy training for 10sessions of 9 minutes, while the control group did not receive the training certificate. The data were analyzedthrough multivariate analysis of covariance.

The results of the research data analysis showed that imago therapy training was effective inimproving cognitive flexibility and reducing cognitive avoidance of subjects (P<0.01).

The results of this research indicated the useful application of imago therapy training approachin improving cognitive flexibility and reducing cognitive avoidance of mothers with intellectually disabledchildren.