Comparing the effectiveness of schema therapy with cognitive behavioral therapy on negative emotions in women with MS

Negative emotions are one of the things that a person with MS is dealing with and it reduces their opportunities to establish social interactions, and this issue threatens their social relationships, quality of life, and as a result, their mental health. The purpose of this study was to compare the effectiveness of schema therapy with cognitive behavioral therapy on negative emotions in women with MS in Kermanshah.

The current research was of applied purpose type and in terms of methodology, it was semi-experimental with a pre-test-post-test design, a control group and a two-month follow-up. The statistical population of the research included all women with multiple sclerosis (MS) in Kermanshah during 2019-2020 who had referred to the Imam Reza Educational-Therapeutic Center. In this research, in order to select the research sample, first of all, among the female patients with multiple sclerosis who were referred to the Imam Reza Educational-Therapeutic Center (AS) in Kermanshah to receive medical services, the research questionnaires were distributed (taking into account the observance of all health principles in the face of the corona virus disease), the data collection tool included the DASS-21 questionnaire. Analysis of variance with repeated measurements and SPSS software were used for statistical analysis of data.

The findings showed that there was a statistically significant difference in the overall negative emotions scores of the participants in the control group compared to the negative emotions scores of the participants in the first intervention group (schema therapy) and the participants in the cognitive behavioral therapy group. This is while there was no significant difference in the score of negative emotions between the two intervention groups of schema therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy. This situation applies to the two components of depression and stress. That is, the level of depression and stress of the people in the two educational intervention groups has decreased significantly compared to the people in the control group, but there was no difference between the two intervention groups. Regarding the anxiety component, the results of the follow-up test indicate that although the anxiety of the two intervention groups has a mean difference (2.27 and 2.07) with the control group, this difference is not significant.

Based on the available findings, it can be concluded that there was no difference between the effects of schema therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy on reducing negative emotions.