Middle Eastern Journal of Disability Studies

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Zirak S R, Musa Zadeh T, Nazari V. Effects of Emotion Regulation Training on the Desire for Divorce and Emotional Turmoil in Substance-Dependents’ Spouses. MEJDS 2021; 11 :105-105
URL: http://jdisabilstud.org/article-1-2541-en.html

Background & Objectives: Substance Use Disorders (SUDs), as a general problem and a pervasive disease, increases mortality and the economic costs for individuals and their families. The issue of drug use has always been among the factors that harm the family structure, especially spouses. The main problems in substance dependents’ spouses are despair, fear, guilt, suicide, depression, and isolation. Besides, these women are more prone to experience psychological distress (anxiety, stress, & depression) and a consequent desire for divorce. An efficient intervention in this regard is Emotion Regulation Training (ERT). ERT is a program that develops ER skills in individuals with mental disorders or those exposed to such conditions. The current study aimed to investigate the effects of ERT on emotional turmoil and the desire for divorce in the spouses of individuals with SUDs.
Methods: This was a quasi–experimental study with pretest–posttest and a control group design. The statistical population of the study included all female spouses of individuals referring to SUDs treatment centers in Ardabil City, Iran, in 2019. Eligible participants were entered and randomly replaced in two groups of experimental and control (n=20/group). The sample size selection was conducted for experimental and quasi–experimental studies (≥15/group). The inclusion criteria included no psychological problems and minimum literacy to complete the questionnaires. The exclusion criteria consisted of unwillingness to participate in the program, and two consecutive absences from the intervention sessions. Considering the follow–up and encouragement of researchers to continue participating in the research of the subjects, in the present study, the study subjects did not fall; if any of the subjects remained from only one training session, the researcher of the above program conducted the group. To collect pretest–posttest data, Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale–21 (Lavibund & Lavibund, 1995) and Divorce Desire Questionnaire (Rusbult et al., 1986) were used. The experimental group received nine 75–minute ERT sessions based on the emotion regulation training package (Berking and Whitley, 2014) and the control group remained without any interventions. To analyze the obtained data, descriptive statistics, including mean and standard deviation and inferential statistics, including univariate Analysis of Covariance (ANOVA), Independent Samples t–test, and Chi–squared test were used in SPSS at the significance level of 0.05.
Results: The present research results indicated that ERT indicated a significant difference between the study groups in the desire to divorce (p=0.002), depression (p<0.001), anxiety (p<0.001), and stress (p<0.001). Therefore, part of the individual differences in desire for divorce, depression, anxiety, and stress was due to differences in group membership (the effect of the intervention). The effect of ERT on the desire to divorce, depression, anxiety, and stress was measured to be 0.233, 0.251, 0.440, and 0.380, respectively.
Conclusion: Based on the current study findings, ERT effectively reduced emotional turmoil and desire to divorce among the spouses of substance abusers. Thus, family counselors and therapists can use these findings in clinical interventions.