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Background and Objective: Marriage disturbance and dissatisfaction in marital life have important consequences for the family. This study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of emotion focused couple therapy (EFCT) on marriage function and psychological well-being of women with marrital conflicts.
Methods: This clinical trial study was done on 53 women with marrital conflicts reffered to Binesh, Rastin and Education Counseling Centers in Gorgan, northern Iran during 2016. The participants were randomly divided into intervention and control groups. The Ryff’s psychological well-being scale made and marriage function assessment inventory made were completed before, one week and eight weeks after intervention by the participants. Counselling with EFCT approach was performed for intervention group through 15 group sessions, once a week and lasted for 90-120 minutes. The follow up was done two months later. The marriage function and psychological well-being scores were recorded for each participant at the end of the study and two months after the end of intervention.
Results: At the end of 15 intervention sessions, the mean score of marriage function was significantly higher in intervention group (263.32±22.15) Compared to control group (162.39±31.56) (p<0.05). Also, the mean score of psychological well-being was significantly higher in intervention group (372.48±35.69) compared to control group (237.57±42.38) (p<0.05). Two months after the end of study, the mean score of marriage function of intervention group (268.56±22.95) was significantly more than control group (145.32±11.96) (p<0.05). Also, the mean score of psychological well-being was significantly higher in intervention group (398.64±22.35) in comparsin with controls (201.50±13.32) (p<0.05).
Conclusion: Emotion focused couple therapy promotes marriage function and psychological well-being of women with marrital conflicts through the de-escalation of negative cycles of interaction, changing interactional positions and facilitating the emergence of new solutions to old problems.