Comparing the Effectiveness of Compassion-Focused Therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy on Self-Compassion of Women With Multiple Sclerosis

Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is a chronic and progressive disease of the central nervous system with various and disabling physical–psychological symptoms, which brings about numerous problems for the patient. One of the factors that seems to affect the improvement of the psychological health of patients with MS is the level of self–compassion of these patients. This construct, defined as self–kindness and non–judgmental acceptance of responses to perceived challenges and failures, shows favorable continuous relationships with various psychological characteristics. Today, in addition to drug treatments, other treatments such as complementary treatments are considered and used to treat MS. Compassion–Focused Therapy (CFT) is one of the therapeutic approaches that has drawn the attention of modern therapists for treating certain diseases. Another psychological therapy that seems beneficial in improving the psychological health of patients with MS is Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). So, this study aimed to the effectiveness of CFT and ACT on self–compassion of women with MS.

The research method was quasi–experimental with a pretest–posttest design and a one–month follow–up with the control group. The statistical population of the present study consisted of all female patients with MS who are members of the MS Association of Golestan Province in 2019. There were 60 patients selected by the available sampling method and randomly assigned to two experimental groups and one control group (each group with 20 people). All three groups were evaluated in the pretest, posttest, and follow–up stages using Self–Compassion Scale (Neff, 2003). The inclusion criteria were as follows: female gender, definitive laboratory diagnosis and confirmation of the MS by a neurologist according to the patient's file, age range from 20 to 50 years, having at least primary education, not suffering from severe and acute stages of the disease (relapsing–recovery type patients), at least one year of history of suffering from the disease, completing the informed consent form stating that participation in the study is voluntary, not receiving psychological services outside of therapy sessions. The exclusion criteria were having diagnostic criteria for obvious psychiatric disorders based on a clinical interview, suffering from acute or chronic physical disorders (such as debilitating heart, respiratory, liver, musculoskeletal, and kidney diseases), addiction or alcohol consumption, and a history of participating in treatment programs in relation with CFT and ACT was within the last six months. Data in pretest, posttest and follow–up was gathered via Self–Compassion Scale (Neff, 2003). After assigning subjects to groups, for the first experimental group, CFT for eight sessions (two sessions per week for 45 minutes), and the second experimental group, ACT in eight sessions of one and a half hours. During the treatment packages in the experimental groups, the patients in the control group did not receive any treatment. To analyze the data at the level of descriptive statistics, average and standard deviation indices were used. At the level of inferential statistics, the Kruskal–Wallis test, analysis of variance with repeated measures and Bonferroni post hoc were used in SPSS version 24 software. The significance level of all tests was set at 0.05.

Regarding the group effect, there was a significant difference between the experimental groups (CFT & ACT) and the control group in the self–compassion variable and its components (p<0.001). Regarding the time effect, between the three stages of pretest, posttest and follow–up, there was a significant difference in the self–compassion variable and its components in the experimental groups (CFT & ACT) and the control group (p<0.001). Also, there was a significant difference between the pretest, posttest, and follow–up stages between the treatment groups (CFT & ACT) and the control group in the self–compassion variable and its components (p<0.001). Regarding the posttest and follow–up stages, there was a significant difference between the two experimental groups (CFT & ACT) and the control group (p<0.001) and between the experimental groups (p<0.001) in the self–compassion variable and its components.

Based on the findings of the research, both CFT and ACT are effective in improving self–compassion in women with multiple sclerosis. However, by analogy, CFT is significantly more effective.