Effectiveness of Optimism Group Training through an Islamic Approach on Marital Commitment of Married Female Nurses Working in Yazd Shahid Sadoughi Hospital

Introduction: Marital commitment is the most important factor affecting the family stability. Nurses are mostly exposed to psychological stress and marital problems. Therefore, it is important to conduct interventions in order to prevent exacerbation of these problems and to improve the mental health and quality of marital life in nurses. The purpose of this study was to assess the effectiveness of an optimism group training intervention through an Islamic approach on the marital commitment of female nurses working in Yazd Shahid Sadoughi Hospital, Iran.  Methods: This quasi-experimental study was conducted using a pre-test and post-test and case-control design. The statistical population included 30 married female nurses working in Yazd Shahid Sadoughi Hospital, Iran in 2018. The participants were selected using available sampling method. Later, they were randomly assigned into the intervention (15 participants) and control (15 participants) groups. The research tool included the Adams and Jones 's Marriage Commitment Questionnaire (1997). Both groups took a pre-test. Next, the intervention group underwent the optimism group training using an Islamic approach. The training intervention was conducted in eight sessions of 90 minutes. After training, both groups were subjected to the post-test. The results were analyzed using covariance analysis. Results: The average age of 30 participants was 38.13 years. A significant difference was found between the two groups regarding their marital commitment before the intervention (P <0.05 and F = 104.62). A significant difference was found between the two groups regarding their mean scores of the personal commitment, ethical commitment, and structural commitment in the post-test stage after eliminating the pre-test effect (p <0.05). The effect size of education was equal to 59.03, 0.52, and 0.617 for the personal commitment, ethical commitment, and structural commitment, respectively. Conclusion: Optimism group training through an Islamic approach was effective on the increase of marital commitment and its subscales (personal commitment, ethical commitment, and structural commitment) among the nurses. Considering the presence of counseling centers in most hospitals, it is recommended to implement this training for nurses in the form of syndicated programs.