comparing the effectiveness of life enhancement and advancement program and reality therapy on improving in-treatment substance abusers’ recovery indices

abstract successful treatment of drug abusers is hard to achieve without the abusers’ taking part in counseling and group therapy interventions. the present study compared the effectiveness of two group interventions, i.e., life enrichment and enhancement program (leap) and reality therapy (rt) with a sham control on improving the abusers’ improvement indicators. participants (n = 30) were in-treatment drug abusers, who were randomly assigned to one of the three groups. all participants completed the same battery of measures at pretest, posttest and follow-up. multivariate analysis of variance was used to test the study hypotheses. compared with participating in the sham educational group, participants in the rt group improved on their locus of control, positive sense of control, temptation to use drugs, and satisfaction with life; participants in the leap group improved on happiness, negative sense of control, situational confidence, temptation to use drugs, and satisfaction with life. overall, leap was more effective in improving indices of treatment progress than rt.