The Effectiveness of Attachment-Oriented Couple Therapy on Anxiety Sensitivity and Emotion Regulation in Women with Marital Conflict

Marital conflicts are among the issues that can cause damage to the family foundation. The present study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of attachment-oriented couple therapy on anxiety sensitivity and emotion regulation in women with marital conflict. The research method was semi-experimental with a pre-test-post-test design with a control group. The statistical population of the current study included all women with marital conflicts who referred to the counseling centers of Arak City in the six months of summer and autumn of 2022, from whom 24 people were selected and randomly divided into two groups of 12 people in experimental and control groups. Attachment-oriented couple therapy was held in the form of 8 sessions of 90 minutes and one session per week for the experimental group. Also, to evaluate the intervention's effect, the participants answered the questionnaires on the emotion regulation of Gross and John (2003) and the anxiety sensitivity of Floyd et al. (2005). Data were also analyzed by the Yeoman-Whitney test and SPSS-23 software. The results showed that attachment-oriented couple therapy increased the level of emotional inhibition and re-evaluation (emotional regulation) and reduced physical anxiety, lack of cognitive control of physical anxiety, lack of cognitive control, and fear of observation (anxiety sensitivity) (P<0.05). Attachment-based couple therapy can decrease marital conflict, especially emotional and anxiety conflicts, and increase the quality of married life.