Middle Eastern Journal of Disability Studies

Abstract
Background & Objectives: Divorce is a common life event around the world. Despite its growing prevalence and social acceptance, it continues to be associated with several debilitating behavioral, emotional, and financial consequences for divorcing partners and their children, especially divorced women. One of the problems seen in women after divorce is psychological adjustment. Psychological adaptation refers to a person's positive response to changes in the external environment and adapting their mental and behavioral patterns to environmental changes and developmental needs to achieve a balance between themselves and the environment. Group schema therapy for women after divorce has been less studied, and in these studies, its effect on psychological adjustment as an influential factor in women has been less studied. Without addressing the psychological problems of women after divorce, it has a significant impact on the long–term quality of life of these women and endangers other parts of their lives, such as their employment status. Therefore, this research aimed to investigate the effectiveness of group therapy on the psychological adjustment of divorced women living in Meybod County, Iran.
Methods: This quasi–experimental study employed a pretest–posttest design with a control group. Among divorced women aged 25 to 40 referring to psychological clinics in Meybod County, 30 eligible volunteers were included in the study; 15 were randomly assigned to the intervention group and 15 to the control group. The inclusion criteria for divorced women without a spouse were a maximum of 2 years of divorce, an age range of 25 to 40 years, and not using other treatment methods such as behavioral therapy and drug therapy. The exclusion criteria included absence from a treatment session and failure to complete the questionnaire during the research. Each study sample completed the consent form to participate in the research. The initial assessment of the subject was conducted on the first day and lasted for 90 minutes. The subject's file and information, such as the treatments received, were also completed. Before the treatment, the sample subjects signed a consent form for voluntary participation in the study. Then, the Bell Adjustment Inventory (Bell, 1961) was administered to the subjects, and the results were recorded in the subject's files. In the subsequent sessions, which were coordinated with the subjects according to the schedule, the intervention group subjects received the therapy schema in 8 sessions twice a week in a group for 4 weeks. No treatment was provided to the control group. The Bell Adjustment Inventory (Bell, 1961) was re–assessed at the end of treatment, and the results were recorded. Data analysis was done using covariance analysis in SPSS version 17. The significance level of the tests was set at 0.05.
Results: The analysis of covariance with adjustment for the pretest effect showed a significant difference in the mean psychological adjustment between the intervention group receiving group schema therapy and the control group without any intervention at the posttest (p<0.001). The results regarding the effect size also indicated that 71% of the difference between the intervention group and the control group in the psychological adjustment component was due to the implementation of group schema therapy.
Conclusion: The results of the present study showed that group schema therapy has a significant effect on the psychological adjustment of divorced women of Meybod County and can lead to improvement of psychological adjustment in these women.