The Effectiveness of Schema Therapy on Alexithymia and Marital Conflicts in Couples with Family Differences

The aim of the present study was to investigate the effectiveness of schema therapy on alexithymia and marital conflicts in couples with family differences in Tehran in 1401. The current study was a semi-experimental study with a pre-test-post-test design with a control group. The statistical population of the study included all couples with family disputes who referred to the offices of the Dispute Resolution Council in Tehran, who were selected by the purposeful sampling method and placed in two experimental (15 people) and control (15 people) groups. The experimental group underwent schema therapy training for 8 sessions, and the control group remained waiting for treatment during this period. The method of data collection was based on alexithymia questionnaire (Toronto, 1994) and marital conflicts (Sanaei et al., 2017). The reliability of the questionnaire was calculated using the Cronbach's alpha method, and its value was found to be above 0.7 for the alexithymia questionnaire and 0.81 for the marital conflicts questionnaire. Likewise, content validity was used to test the validity of the questionnaire, and for this purpose, the questionnaires were approved by the relevant experts. The analysis of the information obtained from the implementation of the questionnaires was done through SPSS19 software in two descriptive and inferential sections (analysis of covariance). The results of the research showed that schema therapy is effective on "alexithymia" of couples with family differences. Also, the results showed that schema therapy is effective on "marital conflicts" of couples with family differences. Therefore, the schema-based intervention method can improve alexithymia and marital conflicts of couples with family differences.