The Effectiveness of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy on Executive Functions and Academic Procrastination of Children with Sluggish Cognitive Tempo

The aim of this research was to investigate the effectiveness of rational emotive behavior therapy on executive functions and academic procrastination of children with sluggish cognitive tempo. The research method was semi-experimental with a pre-test and post-test design with a control group. The statistical population included all children aged 11 to 14 years in the 2nd district of Qom province in 2022, who were meet criteria of sluggish cognitive tempo symptoms based on the psychologist's/psychiatrist's diagnosis. From this statistical population, a sample of 10 children were selected by purposeful sampling and randomly assigned to two groups of 5 people (experimental and control). For the experimental group, rational emotive behavior therapy was implemented in 9 sessions of 45 minutes. The research tools included measure of sluggish cognitive tempo (MSCT, Penny et al., 2009), the coolidge personality and neuropsychological inventory for children (CPNI, Coolidge et al., 2002) and academic procrastination test (APT, Savari, 2011). Data were analyzed using multivariate analysis of covariance. Results showed that by controlling the pretest, there are significant differences between experimental and control groups in the average scores of executive functions and academic procrastination at posttest. Based on these findings, it can be concluded that rational emotive behavior therapy is effective in reducing executive function problems and academic procrastination in children with sluggish cognitive tempo.