Evaluation of knowledge and satisfaction of couple participants in the pre-marriageeducation program: a nationwide study

The "pre-marriage education program" is one of the strategies to strengthen the family foundation in Iran. The present study was carried out with the support of the Iran Ministry of Health and Medical Education to evaluate this program. This paper presents the results obtained on knowledge and satisfaction of couples.

This was an interventional study on a sample of couples participating in a pre-marriage education program. The intervention was offered via in-person and virtual (online and offline) aproaches. Ninety-six centers of pre-marriage education through country were selected by simple random sampling. A convince sample of 15 couples (15 men and 15 women) was thought for each center. Data was collected by two questionnaires and analyzed using the SPSS-18 software.

A total of 2868 people were entered into the study. Pre-marriage education led to an increase in knowledge. The mean score of knowledge changed from 8.78 (SD = 1.693) to 9.34 (SD = 1.639) (P<0.001). The results showed that education has led to a statistically significant increase in the knowledge score of people who participated in in-person and online classes, while offline classes had no effect on increasing the knowledge of couples. Education increased knowledge of employed and unemployed people at all educational levels. Education also increased knowledge in most age groups, but it had no effect on the age group of 46-55 years. Most participants (87.1%) had "high and very high satisfaction" with timing, and overall satisfaction by 90.3% reported as high and very high. About 60% of people reported that the duration of the classes was appropriate. Overall satisfaction of women were more than men. Younger age groups had higher overall satisfaction than other age groups. The satisfaction of the unemployed was more than employed couples. People with higher education had the highest overall satisfaction with the program.

The results showed that the "pre-marriage education program" in achieving short-term goals was successful. Evaluating the effect of the program on long-term goals (such as the effect on marriage outcomes) requires a different study design.