Pages: 34-42

Abstract

This study intended to investigate the effect of compassion-focused therapy of mothers ‎on the self-esteem of preschool children in Isfahan within 2018. To this end, a quasi-‎experimental study was conducted following a test-retest and follow-up scheme. The ‎statistical population included all mothers of preschool pupils amongst which 30 ‎mothers with low self-esteemed children were targeted based on convenience sampling ‎method, which were randomly assigned to two groups of 15 as experimental and ‎control. The experimental group received twelve 90-minute compassion- focused ‎therapy, while no intervention was given to the control group. Assessment tools ‎included a demographic questionnaire and self-esteem inventory. Data were analyzed ‎using repeated measures ANOVA. According to the results, there was a statistically ‎significant difference between the self-esteem scores of experimental and control ‎groups in the pre-test, post-test and follow-up, indicating that the mean self-esteem ‎score was higher in the experimental group than control group in the post-test and ‎follow-up compared to the pre-test stage. Therefore, there was a significant difference ‎between experimental and control group (P˂0.05). The observed scores of the one-‎month follow-up were closer to those of post-test. In general, it was found that ‎compassion- focused therapy of mothers had a statistically significant effect on the ‎self-esteem of preschool children because parental mental health and parental ‎relationship quality could significantly affect the quality of life of their children‎‎‎.