Community Health Journal

Community Health Journal

Efficacy of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy on Depressed Pregnant Women

Authors
H Cheraghian 1
N Heidari 2
SA Ghedami 3
BH Zarei 4
1 MA in School Counseling, Allameh Tabatabai University, Tehran, Iran
2 MA in School Counseling, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran , Iran
3 PhD candidate in counseling, Imam Reza International university, Mashhad, Iran
4 MA in educational psychology, Allameh Tabataba'i University, Tehran, Iran
Abstract
Introduction: Considering the fact that depression during pregnancy has an effect on taking care of the baby as well as the relationship between mother and the child, taking care of other children and the relationship with the spouse, the present study was conducted with the aim of determining the efficacy of the acceptance and commitment therapy on depression during pregnancy.

Materials and methods: The design of this study was quasi-empirical, pretest-posttest with control group. The population included the pregnant women referring to the health care center of Vali-e-Asr in the city of Delfan in the first six months of the year 93, and the sample included 30 women whose score in the Beck depression questionnaire were higher than the mean (40) who were assigned to two groups of 15 randomly. Then, the treatment intervention (the acceptance and commitment therapy) was conducted on the experimental group for 8 sessions, one session in a week. The control group received no treatment. To test the hypothesis the covariance method with the significance level of 0.01 was used.

Results: The results indicated that the independent variable affects the reduction of depression during pregnancy in women with 60% degree. In other words, the acceptance and commitment therapy resulted in a decrease in the depression of pregnant women (F= 59.50 p>0/01).

Conclusion: Since the acceptance and commitment therapy affects the reduction of depression of the women during pregnancy, it is recommended that this treatment be used by the specialists to treat depression during pregnancy.
Keywords
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
depression
Pregnancy
mother
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