Community Health Journal

Community Health Journal

Comparing the Effectiveness of Therapy Based on Acceptance and Commitment and Reality Therapy on Aggression in Female Adolescents

Document Type : Original Article

Authors
F Espahbodi 1
B Mirzaian 2
Gh Abbasi 2
1 PHD student, Dept of Educational Psychology, Sari Branch, Islamic Azad University, Sari, Iran.
2 Assistant Prof, Dept of psychology, Sari Branch, Islamic Azad University, Sari, Iran.
10.22123/chj.2022.297701.1762
Abstract
Introduction: Adolescence is associated with many physical, emotional, psychological and social changes, which increase with the occurrence of aggressive behaviors. The present study aims to compare the effectiveness of therapy based on acceptance and commitment and reality therapy on aggression in female adolescents.
Materials and Methods: The present study is a quasi-experimental pre-test and post-test study with a control group. The statistical population of the study included 15- to 17-year-old female adolescents in Sari, who were studying in the 2019-2020 academic year in secondary schools. Based on a random multi-stage cluster sampling method, 60 students were selected as the main sample and randomly assigned to one of the three groups of acceptance and commitment therapy (n=20), reality based therapy (n=20), or the control group (n=20). Eight sessions of reality therapy and 8 sessions of acceptance and commitment therapy were held for the experimental groups, and the control group did not receive any intervention. The research instrument was a Bass and Perry aggression questionnaire which was completed by the participants in the pre-test and post-test stages. Multivariate analysis of covariance (MANOVA) was used to analyze the collected data.
Results: The mean and standard deviation of the aggression scores for acceptance and commitment therapy, reality therapy and the control group in the pretest stage were 71.87±8.17, 71.64±8.26 and 71.53±8.09, respectively. In the post-test, the aggression scores for the two experimental groups were significantly lower than the control group (p<0.001).
Conclusion: The results of the study showed that therapy based on acceptance and commitment and reality therapy were effective in reducing students’ aggression and that acceptance therapy was more effective.
Keywords
Adolescence
Aggression
Reality Therapy
Therapy based on Acceptance and Commitment
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