Comparing the Effectiveness of Treatment Based on Acceptance and Commitment and Therapy Focused on Compassion on Cognitive Distortions of Adolescents with bad Parents

Background: The study aimed to compare the effectiveness of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) and compassion-focused therapy (CFT) on cognitive distortions in adolescents living in difficult family situations. Methods: The current study utilized a semi-experimental design with a pre-test, post-test, and follow-up, involving random assignment of subjects to experimental and control groups. Forty-five abused teenage girls from abusive homes in Mahabad city were selected. They were randomly assigned to two experimental groups (15 people each) and a control group (15 people). All subjects completed the Cognitive Distortions Questionnaire developed by Beck and Weissman (1987). The experimental groups received therapy sessions based on ACT by Efort and Forsis (2009) and CFT by Gilbert (2009), while the control group did not receive any intervention. The collected data were analyzed using mixed-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) with SPSS version 27. Results: The results indicated no significant difference between the effectiveness of ACT and CFT. Both therapies were found to have a positive and significant impact on reducing cognitive distortions in the participants. Conclusions: The findings suggest that both ACT and CFT are effective therapeutic approaches in reducing cognitive distortions in adolescents from difficult family backgrounds.