Effectiveness of Bowen’s family therapy approach on emotional attachment of couples referring to counseling centers of Shahrerey

Subject Areas : social psychology

Mina shahMohammadi Mehrjerdi, ¹ (PhD Student, Department of Counseling, Rodehen Branch, Islamic Azad University, Rodehen, Iran)
Farideh Dokaneifard ² (Assistant Professor, Department of Counseling, Rodehen Branch, Islamic Azad University, Rodehen, Iran)
Abdollah Shafiabadi ³ (Professor, Department of Counseling, Allameh Tabatabaei University, Tehran, Iran)

Received: 2018-06-16 Accepted : 2018-09-23 Published : 2019-01-21

Keywords: emotional attachment, family therapy, Couples,

Abstract :

This research aimed to determine the effectiveness of Bowen’s family therapy approach on emotional attachment of couples referring to counseling centers of Shahrerey. This research was a semi-experimental with a pre-test, post-test and fallow up design with control group. Research population was couples with marital conflict referring to counseling centers of Shahrerey in winter season of 2016 year. Sample research was 40 couple that were selected through available sampling method and randomly assigned to two equal groups. The experimental group trained 10 sessions of 90 minutes with Bowen’s family therapy approach and the control group was placed in the waiting list for training. Data were collected by marital conflict questionnaire (Sanaei, 2008) and experiences in close relationship revised questionnaire (Sibley & et al, 2005) and analyzed by repeated measurement method.The findings showed that there was a significant difference between the experimental and control groups in the emotional attachment of couples in post-test and fallow up stages. In the other words Bowen’s family therapy approach significantly led to decrease the attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance of couples in post-test and fallow up stages (P<0/05). The results showed that the Bowen’s family therapy approach was effective on emotional attachment of couples, therefore clinical psychologists and therapists can use from Bowen’s family therapy approach to improve emotional attachment of couples.