The Effect of Emotion Therapy on Psychological Health and Self-Esteem of People at Risk of Divorce

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of divorced relationships has nearly tripled in the past 40 years, with one million American children experiencing family breakdown each year following the divorce of their parents (7). Meanwhile, the frequency of divorce in Iran is high compared to some industrialized countries in the West and even some third world societies and Muslims such as Algeria (8). Which doubles the need to pay attention to this issue.Consequences of divorce include women's exposure to various pressures and psychological problems, lack of motivation, impatience and depression, and children's exposure to various mental and behavioral problems, including severe anxiety, isolation, aggression and academic failure (9). The effects and harms of separation are increasing with divorce, and most of all, they threaten the mental health of people in society. Divorce and the breakdown of life lead to a disturbance of the psychological-emotional balance of family members, and because the stress itself is so severe, mental disorders are especially likely to occur, especially for women (10).Due to the importance of psychological characteristics in individual and social life on the one hand and the negative impact of divorce on these characteristics on the other hand has led researchers to constantly seek to find a way to reduce the negative effects of divorce and methods They have also used various. Therefore, reviewing research conducted in and outside the country, no research was found to investigate the effect of emotion-oriented education on psychological characteristics and self-esteem in divorced couples.

For the purpose of conducting research and quasi-experimental present, among the couples seeking divorce in Malayer in 1398, 30 couples were selected by available sampling method and randomly divided into experimental (15 couples) and control (15 couples) groups. Cooper-Smith self-esteem test and General Health Questionnaire (GHO) were used to collect data in the pre-test stage. After completing the questionnaires, the subjects in the experimental group underwent emotion therapy intervention for 12 one-hour sessions (Table 1). At the end of the sessions, both groups completed the questionnaires again. Finally, descriptive statistics, Shapirovilk test were used to examine the natural distribution of data and independent t-test was used to analyze the data.

Based on descriptive statistics, it was found that the mean age of the experimental group was 35.86. 4.42 and the control group was 32.60 7 7.03. The results showed that emotional therapy increased self-esteem and decreased the overall score of mental health under the subscales of social dysfunction, anxiety and depression. Also, the score under the subscale of physical symptoms had a significant improvement (Table 2).

The results of the present study showed that emotional intervention has a significant effect on self-esteem and psychological characteristics of people at risk of divorce. As self-esteem increased after the intervention period, mental health, social dysfunction, anxiety, depression and physical shoulders also improved significantly. Explaining this finding, it can be said that this treatment may try to change a person's beliefs and attitudes by challenging the individual's thoughts and reducing cognitive errors. By influencing social support, it can increase their adaptation to their problems. It is also possible for people to reduce their negative emotions by using emotions correctly, being aware of and accepting emotions, and expressing emotions, especially positive emotions in life situations, which in turn will improve their emotional adjustment in terms of social adjustment (19).Since emotion-based intervention emphasizes logical thinking and the correct expression of psychological and emotional reactions, and in this type of intervention, awareness of emotions and feelings and skills of understanding emotion and choosing a situation are taught. Will have a significant effect on psychological characteristics (24).