The effectiveness of positive group psychotherapy in increasing the happiness among mothers of children with special needs

The birth of any child with special needs will expose families and parents to new problems. The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of positive group psychotherapy in increasing happiness among mothers of children with special needs. The research method was quasi experimental with pretest-posttest on a 45- day follow-up with control group design. For this purpose, 20 mothers of children with special needs living in Mashhad were selected. Ten mothers were then randomly assigned to each of experimental and control groups. The experimental group received the intervention during 10 weekly 90-minute sessions; however, the control group did not receive any intervention. For gathering the data, the Oxford Happiness Inventory (OHI) was used. The results revealed that positive group psychotherapy has been effective in increasing the happiness of the mothers. Utilizing this method could be effective in enhancing the mental health of the mothers of children with special needs.