Purpose: The negative effects of having a child with special needs is accompanied by a lot of tension and causes a lot of psychological damage to the family, especially the mother as the main caregiver. Therefore, this study was conducted with the aim of evaluating the effectiveness of cognitive-behavioral therapy and existential therapy in a group manner on the psychological functioning of mothers with exceptional children.
Materials and methods:
Materials and methods: It was a semi-experimental research and its design was pre-test-post-test and 3-month follow-up with a control group. The statistical population included all mothers with exceptional children in the elementary school of Qarchak city of Tehran. 36 people were selected with the purposeful sampling method and replaced by randomization in three groups of 12 people. Therapeutic interventions were applied during 8 sessions (one session of 60 minutes per week) for the experimental groups, but the control group did not receive any intervention. Demographic information checklist and general health questionnaire (Goldberg & Putnam, 1972) were used to collect data. Data analysis with descriptive statistics, test of parametric statistical assumptions and analysis of variance with repeated measurements were used with the help of SPSS version 24 statistical software.
Findings: The results showed that the psychological function, physical symptoms, mood problems, anxiety and insomnia and social skills of the experimental groups have significantly improved compared to the control group and this improvement It remained stable in the follow-up phase (P<0.05). Also, the results showed that there is no significant difference between the usefulness of the two intervention methods, existentialism and cognitive-behavioral methods, in the post-test and follow-up stages (P<0.05)
Conclusion, The findings show that these intervention methods can be used to improve the social-emotional condition of mothers with exceptional children as effective intervention methods