The Association between General Health and EmotionalDivorce in the Clients Referring to Family Counseling Centers in Ilam City

Emotional divorce as a social damage is the first step in the process of divorce and represents a destabilizing marital relationship that enhances the feeling of alienation in couples and affects the general health and mental health of family members. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between general health and emotional divorce in couples referred to Ilam Family Counseling Center.

In this cross-sectional study, 217 individuals referred to Ilam Family Counseling Center were recruited through simple random sampling. The standard questionnaire of emotional divorce and general health questionnaire (GHQ-28) was used. Data were analyzed by descriptive and inferential statistics, including mean and standard deviation, Pearson correlation, t-test methods and one-way ANOVA.

The mean age of the couples in this study was 36.69 ±17.85 years. The mean score of emotional divorce and general health were 39.48±6.25 and 40.34±10.12, respectively. There was a statistically significant relationship between emotional divorce and general health and its dimensions (P=0.01). Also, there was a significant relationship between emotional divorce with variables of age (P=0.01) and gender (P=0.03) and education (P=0.02).

Overall, Considering the relationship between general health and emotional divorce and the relationship between these two factors, improving factors related to general health and mental health in the family, such as developing programs to educate and inform the mental health components and provide the necessary framework for enhancing relationships between couples with emphasis on Health factors can have a direct effect on emotional divorce.