Effect of Short-term Solution-focused Approach on the Coping Strategies and Mental Toughness of Outstanding Students

This research was aimed to determine the short-term solution-focused approach on the coping strategies and mental toughness of outstanding students.

The design of this quasi-experimental study was pre-test-post-test with a control group. The statistical population included all the top ninth grade female students in Mashhad in the academic year 2018-19. Their number was estimated at 611 people. After the initial evaluation, 30 students who lower scored than the others in the psychological toughness test were selected by purposive sampling as a research sample and assigned to two identical groups of 15 experiments and controls. The experimental group received group-centered group therapy in eight sessions of 90 minutes each week, and The control group did not receive any intervention. In order to collect information, the questionnaires of coping strategies of Lazarus and Folkman and psychological toughness of Kubasa et al. Were used in two stages of pre-test and post-test. Multivariate analysis of covariance was used to analyze the data.

According to the results, by controlling the effect of pre-test, there was a significant difference between the mean scores of post-test in the experimental and control groups in the variables of emotion-focused, problem-focused and mental toughness (P<0.001).

In general, the short-term solution-focused approach has a significate effect on reducing the emotion-focused and increasing the problem-focused and mental toughness of outstanding students.