The Effect of Cognitive Behavioral Counseling on Parent-Child Relationship in Mothers of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

having a child with autism spectrum disorder can put a lot of stress and pressure on parents and affect their quality of life, as compared to parents of normal children. In this sense, the present study aimed to identify and determine the effectiveness of group cognitive behavioral counseling of the parents of children with autism spectrum disorder on their communication interactions with children.

Population consisted of mothers of children with autism spectrum disorder in the city of Shiraz, of which 40 eligible volunteers were selected using purposeful sampling method and were randomly divided in two groups of 20 (control and experiment) in the academic year of 2018-2019. Data collected via Pianta Parent-Child Relationship Scale (1994).  Having completed the questionnaires by the target population, the experiment group received the intervention training program of group cognitive behavioral counseling for 10 sessions, each for 1 hour. However, the control group received no intervention training. Multi-variate covariance analysis and SPSS 22 were used to analyze data. The significance level was considered as 0.01.

the results showed that the group cognitive behavioral counseling for mothers of children with autism spectrum disorder was effective on communication interaction with children and improved it (P=0.001). Regarding the assessed effect, it should be noted that the degree of changes, according to eta coefficient (effect rate) was 23.3%.

according to the findings, group cognitive behavioral intervention method can be effective on improving parenting for children with autism spectrum disorder.