Comparison of the Effectiveness of Spiritual-Self Schema and Emotion-Focused Therapies on Attachment Injuries on Depression and Self Injury Behavior of Women Injured by Husband’s Infidelity

Husband's infidelity is a factor that undermines the well-being of many women. This study aimed to evaluate and compare the effectiveness of spiritual-self schema therapy and emotion-focused therapy based on attachment injuries on depression and self-injury behavior of women injured by their husband's infidelity.

This research was a semi-experimental study with a pretest, posttest and two months follow up design with a control group. The statistical population included all women hurted by their husband's infidelity referred to psychological counseling centers in Bandarabbas in spring 2021, forty-eight of them were selected by purposive sampling method and randomly assigned to two experimental groups and a control group, sixteen persons for each. Beck's depression inventory (BDI-II) and self-injury behavior questionnaire were used to collect data. Spiritual-self schema therapy and emotion-focused therapy based on attachment injuries were performed in the two experimental groups in ten sessions of ninety minutes per week. For data analysis, a mixed design with repeated measures analysis of variances was performed by SPSS26.

The results showed that the interaction between group and time elements on depression was significant.(P<0.01) In the sense that, spirituality based schema therapy and emotion-focused therapy based on attachment injuries significantly decreased depression in the experimental groups. Also, results indicated that there was no significant difference between the effectiveness of spiritual-self schema therapy and emotion-focused therapy based on attachment injuries in decreasing self-injury behavior.(P>0.05) 

The spiritual-self schema therapy and emotion-focused therapy based on attachment injuries are effective for decreasing depression in women injured by husband's infidelity; and both can be used to help hurted by husband's infidelity's women .