The Effect of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy on Distress Tolerance in Mothers of Children with Autism

Background and Purpose: Presence of a child with a disability may be the source of a great deal of stress for any member of the family. Therefore, the present study was conducted to investigate the effect of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) on distress tolerance of mothers with autistic children. This semi-experimental study was of pretest-posttest control group design. The research population consisted of all mothers with autistic children in Esfahan in 2017, of whom 30 were selected by convenience sampling and then randomly assigned to the experimental or control group (n= 15 per group). However, due to the dropout, only 10 subjects remained in the control group and 12 in the experimental one. Distress tolerance scale (Simons & Gaher, 2005) was used for data collection. The experimental group underwent eight 90-minute sessions of group therapy based on acceptance and commitment, while the control group received no intervention. The data were analyzed by multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA). The results showed that acceptance and commitment therapy had a positive effect on distress tolerance and its components (emotional distress tolerance, distress appraisal, and distress regulation) (p<0.05), but it was of no effect on distress absorption by negative emotions (p<0.05). Based on the results of the present study, it can be concluded that acceptance and commitment therapy can be effective in increasing the distress tolerance of mothers with autistic children by promoting their psychological flexibility and other mental health indices.