The comparison of effectiveness of emotion-focused couple therapy and mindfulness-based stress reduction program on emotional divorce of couples

The purpose of this study was to compare of the effectiveness of emotion-focused couple therapy and mindfulness-based stress reduction program on the emotional divorce of couples. This semi-experimental study was conducted with a pretest-posttest design with a control group and follow-up for two months. The statistical population included all the couples referring to counseling and psychological services in Shiraz city to 91 people were in 1399 and 60 couples by random sampling were considered as the sample size in two experimental groups (each group of 10 couples) and control (10 couples). The experimental groups underwent emotion-focused couple therapy (9 sessions 90 minutes) and a mindfulness-based stress reduction program (9 sessions 90 minutes), but the control group received no training and remained in the waiting list. To collect data Kessler emotional divorce Questionnaire (EDQ) of Guttman (1995). Data analysis by repeated-measures analysis of variance and Bonferroni post hoc test showed that both therapies had a significant effect on emotional divorce in the post-test and follow-up stages compared to the control group (P <0.05). Also, emotion-oriented couple therapy was more effective in reducing emotional divorce compared to stress-based mindfulness (P <0.05). Based on the findings, it can be concluded that emotional couple therapy and mindfulness-based stress reduction can be used as treatment methods to reduce emotional divorce in medical centers.