Comparing the Effectiveness of Psychotherapy based on Narrative Therapy and Cognitive-behavioral Therapy on increasing the Meaning of Life of Opioid-dependent Patients after Detoxification

The lack of meaning in life is among the factors that can affect the successful treatment of addiction-related patients. Accordingly, identifying the most effective psychological treatments and interventions in this regard is of great importance. As a result, the present study aimed to compare the effectiveness of psychotherapy based on narrative therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy on increasing the meaning of life of opioid-dependent patients after detoxification.

This semi-experimental research had a pre-test and post-test design and follow-up with a control group. The statistical population was the patients of state-funded addiction treatment centers in Bojnurd, Iran, in 2022. Due to the semi-experimental nature of the project, a sample of 45 people was selected according to the inclusion criteria from the statistical community by the available sampling method, who were randomly divided into three groups of 15 people, including two experimental groups and one control group. The tool used in this research was the Meaning of Life Questionnaire developed by Steger et al. (2006). The experimental groups separately were subjected to 8 sessions of 90 minutes of psychotherapy based on narrative therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy, while the control group did not receive any training. The collected data was analyzed using repeated measures analysis of variance and Ben Ferroni's post hoc test in SPSS software (version 25).

The obtained results indicated the effectiveness of both narrative therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy on increasing the meaning of life (P<0.001). Therefore, both approaches increased the meaning of patients' lives. Of note, the narrative therapy was more effective than cognitive- behavioral therapy in the post-test and follow-up period (P<0.05).

The results of this research showed that narrative therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy can be used to increase the meaning of life of opioid-dependent patients.