The effectiveness of play therapy on the aggressive behavior of children with ADHD

Samaneh Panahian Amiri; Kolsoum Akbar Nataj; Mohammadkazem Fakhri

doi:10.61838/kman.aftj.3.3.17

Authors

Samaneh Panahian Amiri PhD Student, Department of Psychology, Sari Branch, Islamic Azad University, Sari, Iran. Author https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7604-784X
Kolsoum Akbar Nataj Assistant Professor, Department of Nursing, Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery, Islamic Azad University, Chalous Branch, Chalous, Iran. Author https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2657-8030
Mohammadkazem Fakhri Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, Sari Branch, Islamic Azad University, Sari, Iran. Author https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5978-7798

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.61838/kman.aftj.3.3.17

Keywords:

play therapy, aggressive behavior, children, ADHD.

Abstract

Aim: The aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness of play therapy on the aggressive behavior of children with ADHD. Methods: The statistical population of this study includes all children with confrontational disobedience disorder in Babol in 2019, from which 60 people were purposefully selected and using a random method in two groups of play therapy and control group, each group was assigned 30 people. Data were obtained using a child behavioral problems questionnaire in three time periods: pre-test, post-test and follow-up. Play therapy was performed in ten sessions for 2 hours weekly for the experimental group. Analysis of variance with repeated measures and SPSS software were used to analyze the data. Results: The results showed that there was a significant difference between the effectiveness of play therapy on improving aggressive behavior (F=38.86, p<0.001) in children with ADHD. Conclusion: The study showed that play therapy reduced the aggressive behavior of children with ADHD and this treatment can be used to improve the aggressive behavior of children with ADHD.