Effectiveness of emotional regulation training on affective, social and educational adjustment in 10 to 14 years boys suffering from conduct disorder

Aim: The aim of present study was to investigate effectiveness of emotional regulation training on affective, social and educational adjustment in 10 to 14 years boys’ student suffering from conduct disorder. it was a quasi-experimental with control, experimental group and pretest, posttest, and follow-up was 2 months. Target population was 68 pupils aged 10 to 14 years old who referred to counseling center of Rahe Novin Zendegi in Gonbad kavous from October to November 2017, among which, 30 students who had the highest score in Sinha and Sing Student Adjustment Inventories 1993 and Parents' Parenting, Gadowc& Sprafkin (2007) were selected through convenience sampling and randomly assigned into two groups of experimental and control. The experimental group received 8 weekly 90-minute sessions based on combination of McGee, Wood, and Brentley (2011) and Allen, Maggie and Barlow (2009) guidelines for emotional regulation. The control group did not receive any interventions during this period. Data were analyzed using mixed variance repeated measures. Results showed significant difference between function of experimental and control group in Symptoms of conduct disorder (F= 19.27, P= 0.001), total adjustment (F= 59.02, P= 0.001), affective adjustment (F= 19.86, P= 0.01), social adjustment (F= 47.83, P= 0.001) and educational adjustment (F= 32.05, P= 0.001) in post test and after two month of follow up. Since the training of emotional regulation is directly influencing on interaction of individual with peers and community and reduces the symptoms of conduct disorder, hence, this method can be used in families, educational institute and Psychological and Counseling Services Centers in Iran in order to improve symptoms of conduct disorder.