The effectiveness of self-compassion treatment on loneliness and life expectancy in elderly women

Aging is a sensitive period of human life, in which aging people are at increased risk of chronic illness, social isolation and lack of social protection, and are often threatened in many cases, their autonomy by their physical and mental disabilities. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of self-compassion-focused therapy on loneliness and life expectancy in senior women. The present study was a semi-experimental design with a pretest-posttest design with the control group. The statistical population consisted of the elderly in Zanjan city, 30 of whom were eligible to participate in the research, they were randomly selected as samples and subjected to exprimental and control in two groups of 15 and completed the questionnaire of the loneliness of Russell and Miller's life expectancy. The experimental group received an 8-session self-compassion treatment, during which time the control group did not receive any psychological training or therapy. Data were analyzed by SPSS 21 software using covariance analysis. The results of this study showed that self-compassion-focused therapy could have a significant effect on reducing loneliness and increasing the life expectancy of senior women (P = 0.001). According to the importance of the elderly population in each community, it is suggested that self-compassion-focused education or treatment be used to reduce loneliness and increase life expectancy in this group.