THE ROLE OF PRIMARY MALADAPTIVE SCHEMAS IN THE POSITIVE THINKING OF NURSING STUDENTS WITH THE MEDIATING ROLE OF COGNITIVE REGULATION OF EMOTION

Schemas arise due to the failure to fulfill the primary emotional needs of childhood. A person who has mental health can adaptively satisfy these basic emotional needs. The present study was conducted to test the modeling of primary maladaptive schemas in the positive thinking of Yazd nursing students with the mediation of cognitive emotion regulation.

This was a descriptive and correlational study. The statistical population included all Yazd Paramedical University nursing students in 2021-2022. Among the 800 students, 183 females and 77 males were selected using the Random sampling. The research tools included Garnevsky's Emotional Cognitive Questionnaire (2001), SF-SQ Early Inconsistent Schemas Questionnaire, Yang and Braun (2005), and Ingram and Wysinski's Positive Thinking Questionnaire (1998). Descriptive and inferential statistics methods (Pearson correlation, Path analysis, and Structural Equation Model) were used to analyze the data using SPSS ver. 25.0 and AMOS 24 software. P = 0.01 was considered significant.

The findings showed that cognitive emotion regulation can significantly mediate between the primary maladaptive schemas and students' positive thinking. The results of structural equation modeling showed that none of the primary maladaptive schemas could directly and significantly predict positive thinking. Positive cognitive discipline directly, positively, and significantly (0.69) predicts positive thinking in nursing students. Negative cognitive discipline directly, negatively, and significantly (-0.17) predicts positive thinking in nursing students.

The results showed that it is possible to increase positive thinking in nursing students by using schema therapy techniques and modifying maladaptive schemas. Considering the mediating role of cognitive emotions, it is suggested that universities of medical sciences help students increase their positive thinking by holding educational workshops on cognitive regulation of emotions.