Comparison of the Effectiveness of Contextual Schema Therapy and Mode-Based Schema Therapy on Emotion Regulation in Individuals with Migraine
Keywords:
Migraine, mode-based schema therapy, contextual schema therapy, emotion regulationAbstract
The present study aimed to compare the effectiveness of mode-based schema therapy and contextual schema therapy on emotion regulation in individuals with migraine. This study was a quasi-experimental study with a pretest–posttest control group design and a three-month follow-up phase. The statistical population included all individuals with migraine of psychological origin who referred to psychological treatment centers in Tehran in 2024. The research sample consisted of 36 participants who were selected through purposive sampling based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria and were randomly assigned to three groups of 12 participants, including two experimental groups and one control group. Experimental Group A received the contextual schema therapy program (Farrell & Shaw, 2014) in eight weekly 90-minute sessions, and Experimental Group B received the mode-based schema therapy program (Rüdiger et al., 2018) in eight weekly 90-minute sessions. Data were collected using the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (Gross & John, 2003) at three stages, namely pretest, posttest, and follow-up, and were analyzed using repeated-measures analysis of variance in SPSS version 24. The findings showed that both therapeutic approaches, compared with the control group, had a significant effect on improving emotion regulation, particularly in the component of cognitive reappraisal (p < .01). However, no significant difference was observed between the effectiveness of the two therapeutic approaches (p > .05). The therapeutic effects also remained stable at the three-month follow-up stage (p < .01). Mode-based schema therapy and contextual schema therapy are both effective and efficient approaches for improving emotion regulation in individuals with migraine and can be used as complementary interventions alongside common pharmacological treatments. The absence of a significant difference between the two approaches indicates their theoretical and technical overlap at the level of mechanisms of change and enables therapists to select the most appropriate method based on the client’s characteristics.
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