Effectiveness of Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy on Attachment Styles and Coping Strategies among Mothers of Children with Mental Retardation and Motor Disability

The aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy on attachment styles and coping strategies among mothers of children with Mental Retardation and Motor Disability.

The samples were selected by multi-stage cluster random sampling (24 people) and then randomly divided into an experimental group (12 people in the cognitive-behavioral therapy group) and a control group (12) people . Adult attachment Inventory of Colins and Read and coping with stressful situations - short form Inventory of Calsbeek et al were used in the pre-test. In the next step, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy was performed on the experimental group for 8 hours in 8 sessions once a week and the control group did not undergo any intervention. Then, post-test was completed for both groups and the necessary data were collected and analyzed using multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA).

The findings showed that mindfulness-based cognitive therapy program reduces anxiety (P= 0/002, F= 39/944) and avoidance (P= 0/001, F= 51/772) attachment styles and increases safe attachment style (P= 0/000, F= 130/352), as well as reduces emotion- focused (P= 0/001, F= 155/108) and avoidance (P= 0/001, F= 22/695) strategies and increases the problem- focused strategy (P= 0/002, F= 203/127), among mothers of children with Mental Retardation and Motor Disability in the post-test.

Considering the findings, in order to efficiency of attachment styles and coping strategies among mothers of children with Mental Retardation and Motor Disability, more attention should be paid to mindfulness-based cognitive therapy intervention.