Investigating the Effectiveness of Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT) on Emotion Regulation and Perceived Stress of Women Heads of Households

Women heads of households are among vulnerable groups in society who experience increasing tension and stress due to the acceptance of more responsibility for managing life affairs. In addition, these individuals are more prone to physical diseases and psychological disorders. Therefore, the present study aimed to evaluate the effect of compassionfocused therapy (CFT) on the decrease of stress and regulation of emotion in women heads of households in Ilam, Iran.

This quasi-experiment was performed on 30 women heads of households covered by Imam Khomeini Relief Foundation who were selected randomly based on the inclusion criteria and divided randomly into two groups of test and control (15 subjects per group). In the test group, the participants attended eight 90-minute CFT sessions, and data were collected using a perceived stress and emotion regulation questionnaire, which was filled by the subjects in three stages of the pretest, immediately after the intervention, and two months after the program. Moreover, data analysis was performed in SPSS version 25.

In this study, significant changes were observed in the decrease of perceived stress and aspects of emotion regulation in the test group after the intervention (P<0.05). Two months after the intervention, changes caused by training were sustainable and the mean scores of perceived stress and dimensions of emotion regulation were significantly different in the test group, compared to before the intervention (P<0.05).

According to the results of the study, the CFT method could be used to decrease stress in women heads of households and regulate their emotions. Therefore, it could be concluded that the mentioned intervention was effective in decreasing perceived stress and regulating emotions.