The Effect of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy on Marital Conflicts and Interpersonal Processing of Married Women with Emotional Divorce

Abstract

Emotional divorce is accompanied by growing negative emotions and it affects couples’ relationship. Marital conflicts and interpersonal processing are among the important elements of a marital relationship. The present study is aimed at investigating the effect of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (ISTDP) on marital conflict and interpersonal processing of married women with emotional divorce in the city of Tehran. The method of the study was quasi-experimental with pretest-posttest and follow-up with control group design. For this purpose, 40 women who were emotionally divorce were selected using convenience sampling and randomly assigned to control and experimental groups. Experimental group received ISTDP. Results revealed that the experimental group showed reduced conflict levels (F=43.93, p<0.01) and increased interpersonal processing (F= 85.43, p<0.01). Therefore, ISTDP reduces negative emotions and consequent conflicts in marital relationships and improving couples’ interpersonal processing.

Keywords

• interpersonal processing
• marital conflict
• istdp
• couple therapy
• emotional divorce.