Marital Disaffection

Objective: The present study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy on internalized shame, marital disaffection, and inclination toward divorce in couples who had experienced infidelity. Methods: This research was conducted using a quasi-experimental design with pre-test and post-test and a control group. The statistical population of this study consisted of all couples who, due to experiencing infidelity by their spouses, referred to licensed counseling and psychotherapy centers of the Iranian Psychological and Counseling Organization, the State Welfare Organization, or psychiatrists licensed by the Iranian Medical Council (Anis Andisheh Clinic) in District 3 of Tehran, during the first quarter of 2024. In this study, the sample size for each of the experimental groups and the control group was 16 people (8 women and 8 men), and a total of 32 individuals were selected. According to the quasi-experimental design, they were chosen through convenience sampling from among volunteers and then randomly assigned to the experimental and control groups by lottery. Data collection instruments included the Internalized Shame Scale by Cook (1993), the Marital Disaffection Scale by Kaiser (1993), and the Inclination Toward Divorce Scale by Rusbult et al. (1986). In this study, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy consisted of eight weeks of two-hour sessions based on the mindfulness-based cognitive therapy protocol by Crane. Findings: The results of data analysis indicated that mindfulness-based cognitive therapy had an effect on internalized shame, marital disaffection, and inclination toward divorce in couples who had experienced infidelity. Conclusion: Considering the results, it can be stated that mindfulness-based cognitive therapy influences the research variables. It is suggested that further studies be conducted in this area to enhance external validity.

The present study aimed to predict marital disaffection based on early maladaptive schemas with the mediation of cognitive emotion regulation in working women. This research was applied in terms of objective and correlational descriptive in terms of method, which was implemented using structural equation modeling. The statistical population of this research consisted of all working women studying in the Islamic Azad University of Karaj branch in the second semester of 2023-2024, and 308 of them were selected by available sampling method. The study tool included the Marital Disaffection Scale by Kayser (1996); the Young's Schema Questionnaire short version (1998) and the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire by Garnefski et al.'s (2001). The structural equation modeling method was used to analyze the data. The results showed that marital disaffection is predicted based on early maladaptive schemas in working women (P=0.001, β=0.400). Marital disaffection is predicted based on maladaptive (p=0.001, β=0.449) and adaptive (p=0.001, β=-0.378) strategies of cognitive emotion regulation in working women. Marital disaffection is predicted based on based on early maladaptive schemas with the mediation of maladaptive (P=0.001, Z=4.11) and adaptive strategies (P=0.001, Z=3.73) cognitive regulation of emotion in working women.