The Comparison of the Effectiveness of Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy and Spiritual Therapy on Feelings of Loneliness in Older Adults

Choosing appropriate treatment methods that help to solve the problems of older adults will be a great help for human societies. Feelings of loneliness (FOL) is one of the important problems of older adults that affects the health, well-being and longevity of them, and any effort to solve it seems necessary. Therefore, this study was conducted with the aim of comparing the effectiveness of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) and spirituality therapy on FOL in older adults. This was a quasi-experimental study with pretest-posttest-follow-up design with a control group. The statistical population of the research was made up of older adults who were member of neighborhood community centers in Tehran in 2022. The sample of the research consisted of included 54 older people aged 60-75 years, selected using convenience sampling method and according to inclusion and exclusion criteria, and randomly assigned into two experimental groups with 17 members each (MBCT and spiritual therapy) and a control group with 20 members. The measure was Russell et al.’s Loneliness Questionnaire. One of the experimental groups underwent eight 90-minute sessions of MBCT based on the guidelines of Tizdel et al. and the other experimental group received ten sessions of spiritual therapy based on the instructions of Waziri et al. The data were analyzed using analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) in SPSS-24. The results indicated that both MBCT and spirituality therapy groups significantly reduced FOL compared to the control group in both the post-test and follow-up phases (P<.01). However, there was no significant difference between the two therapeutic methods in both the post-test and follow-up phases in reducing FOL (P>.05). Based on the findings of this research, it is suggested to use MBCT and spiritual therapy as therapeutic methods to help reduce FOL in older adults.