Abstract

Background: Marital quality reflects the individual’s total evaluation of marital relationship. The present study was carried out to examine the effect of cognitive behavioral consultation on marital quality among women. Aims and Objectives: The present study was a randomized clinical two-group trial which was carried out using a pre-test and post-test design on 198 qualified women who had referred to the selected healthcare centers in Hamadan in 2016.
Materials and Methods: The intervention participants received four 2-h sessions of cognitive behavioral consultation. Demographic information questionnaire and marital quality scale were completed by the two groups before and after the intervention. To analyze the collected data, independent samples t-test, covariance analysis, or change analysis were employed using SPSS 21.0 software.
Results: The mean age in the control group and the intervention group was 23.58 ± 7.54 and 35.04 ± 7.91 years, respectively. Covariance analysis was utilized to examine the marital quality scores. In this analysis, after the variables of age, marital quality score of agreement and satisfaction before the intervention and income status were modified, the total marital quality score experienced a significant change in all dimensions (P < 0.05), and the mean scores increased remarkably. Moreover, according to the cutoff point of the dimensions, the scores of all dimensions increased remarkably and the proportion of individuals with high marital quality before and after the intervention changed significantly (P < 0.05). Conclusion: Due to the role of sexual relations in stabilizing marriage, cognitive behavioral consultation was effective in improving marital quality, especially after agreement, and can be used in healthcare centers to improve the relationship between couples and reduce divorce statistics.