The Effectiveness of Group Counseling Based on Metacognitive Therapy and Dialectic Behavior Therapy on Reducing Anxiety in Boy Adolescent of Divorce

Background: Anxiety among teenagers may disturb their life, and it is no controlling results in severe problems. Therefore, the present research was designed and conducted by the aim of investigating the effectiveness of group counseling training based on metacognitive therapy & dialectic behavior therapy on reducing anxiety in boy adolescent of divorce.

Methods: The present research conducted by quasi-experimental method and used a pretest-posttest with control group design. The statistical population of the current research included all boy students of divorced parents in Karaj in 2017-2018. Among them, 36 persons selected by convenience sampling method, and they were assigned into experimental and control groups (12 individuals per group) randomly. Before the intervention, the Beck Anxiety Inventory executed on participants. Group counseling therapy based on metacognitive therapy and dialectic behavior therapy provided for the experimental group subjects in sixteen 90-minute sessions, while the participants of the control group received no intervention. Posttest executed for all three groups after completing the training. The research data were analyzed by covariance analysis and by SPSS-22 software.

Results: Covariance analysis findings indicated that metacognitive therapy and dialectic behavior therapy groups had significant decreasing than the control group after interventional (P > 0.05). Also, results indicated than there was no significant difference between the effectiveness of metacognitive therapy and dialectic behavior therapy on anxiety decreasing among boy teenagers of divorced teenagers (P < 0.05).

Conclusion: Based on the results of the present research, we can state that dialectic behavior therapy and metacognitive therapy by changing negative cognitions reduce anxiety among divorced children.