Effectiveness of Positive Psychology on Hope and Resilience in Mothers with Mentally Retarded Children

Mothers with mental retarded children deal with a number of psychological problems and challenges. New psychological interventions, such as positive psychology, have concepts and elements that help mothers improve their hope and resiliency in facing life problems. The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of positive psychology on the hope and resilience of mothers with mentally retarded children. This research had a semi-experimental design and pre-test-posttest with a control group. The research population included all mothers with mentally impaired children in Rofaydeh Hospital of Tehran, during year 2017. Thirty were selected by targeting sampling and then randomly assigned to two groups, experimental and control. The two groups responded in two stages: pre-test and post-test to Responder Questionnaire by Canner and Davidson (2003) and Schneider et al. (1991). The experimental group received 10 positive psychological training sessions. Data were analyzed by covariance test and SPSS software version 20. The findings showed that there was a significant difference between the pre-test of hope scores (19/66 ± 4/99) and post-test (25 ± 4/20) (P = 0.001). In addition, there was a significant difference between the pre-test of resiliency scores (51.66 ± 13.54) and pre-test (57.06 ± 13.54) (P = 0.005) of the experimental group. These changes were not found in the control group. According to the research findings, therapeutic and educational positive psychological interventions could improve hope and resilience of mothers with mentally retarded children. This intervention could be recommended by family counselors at rehabilitation centers for mothers with special needs children.