Middle Eastern Journal of Disability Studies

Abstract
Background & Objectives: Early communication quality plays an essential role in adult marital relationships; therefore, according to experts, communication problems are among the main topics in family-related investigations. One of the most critical factors in establishing healthy relationships is the orientation of people's attachment. Insecurity and attachment anxiety have been introduced as essential factors of marital problems, dissatisfaction, and instability in marital life. Early interactions and relationships with influential people in life create expectations and beliefs in people that direct their perceptions and social behavior about how relationships and relationship partners will be in adulthood. These beliefs play a role in determining people's expected behaviors and actions in attachment situations. Attachment anxiety causes a couple's interpersonal damage. Therefore, the present study was conducted to compare the effectiveness of Gottman's couple therapy with couple therapy based on choice theory on couples' attachment anxiety.
Methods: The research method was quasi-experimental, using a pretest-posttest and follow-up design with a control group. The statistical population of the research comprised all the couples referred to Nejat Sexual Counseling Center in Tehran City, Iran, in 2022. Of them, 45 volunteer and eligible couples were selected. After homogenization of age and duration of marital life, they were assigned to two experimental and one control group(s). Then, the couples of all three groups were evaluated in the pretest and responded to the Experiences in Close Relationships Questionnaire-Revised (ECR-R) (Brennan et al., 1998). After that, the couple therapy sessions were conducted for two experimental groups, while the control group was not subjected to any educational intervention. Gottman's couple therapy interventions were performed in 9 sessions once a week, and each session lasted 90 minutes for one experimental group. The couple therapy based on choice theory was performed in 10 sessions once a week, and each session lasted 90 minutes for another experimental group. Finally, the three groups were re-evaluated in the posttest to measure the effect of the independent variables (Gottman's couple therapy and couple therapy based on choice theory) on the dependent variable (attachment anxiety). After 3 months, a follow-up test was conducted to determine the stability of the effectiveness of couple therapy strategies over time. To analyze the data, analysis of variance with repeated measurements and Bonferroni post hoc test was used in SPSS software and the significance level was set at 0.05.
Results: The findings showed significant effects of group, time, and the interaction of group and time on attachment anxiety (p<0.001). Also, the results indicated a significant difference between the mean scores of Gottman's couple therapy and couple therapy based on selection theory with each other (p=0.044) and with the control group (p=0.033) and (p=0.045) in the attachment anxiety variable. In the two test groups, a significant difference was observed in the mean scores of attachment anxiety in the pretest, posttest, and follow-up (p=0.001). However, no significant difference was observed between the posttest and the follow-up in the two experimental groups, which showed the persistence of the effectiveness of both couples therapy approaches in the follow-up stage (p>0.05).
Conclusion: Based on the findings of the research, Gottman's couple therapy is more effective in reducing attachment anxiety than couples therapy based on choice theory. Therefore, this program is suggested as a preventive approach to problems of a couple.