Effectiveness of parent-child interaction therapy on stress of mothers with slow paced children who have behavioral problems and reducing children’s behavioral problems

This research was done to investigate the effectiveness of parent-child interaction therapy on stress of mothers who have slow paced children with behavioral problems and reducing children’s behavioral problems. This research was quasi-experimental study with pre-test, post-test and follow-up design with control group. Statistical population included all 7-9 years old girl students who had intellectual disorder with behavior problems in the exceptional schools of Gorgan in 2018. From this population, a sample including 24 students with their mothers were chosen by purposive sampling method and placed in experiment and control groups randomly. Tools used for research included Achenbach System of Empirically Based Assessment (ASEBA), Berry & Jones Parental Protection (stress) Scale (PPS). At first, a pre-test was held for both experiment and control groups and then experiment group received parent-child interaction therapy during 15 sessions each 90 minutes. Collected data was reviewed using repeated measure analysis of variance.  Results suggested that parent-child interaction therapy has significant effect on reducing the stress of mothers with slow paced children who have behavioral problems and reducing children’s behavioral problems. Results from follow-up step showed reducing stress of mothers and reducing children’s behavioral problems. Improving the communication skills and increasing the interaction between mother and child can reduce the stress of mothers and children’s behavioral problems