The Effectiveness of Emotion-Focused Therapy on Worry and Uncertainty Intolerance in Patients with Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Sharifzadeh, Masoud; Razeghi, Narges; Aghaei, Hakime; Tabatabaee, Seyed Mosa

doi:10.22059/japr.2025.367877.644775

The Effectiveness of Emotion-Focused Therapy on Worry and Uncertainty Intolerance in Patients with Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Articles in Press

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Masoud Sharifzadeh ¹

Narges Razeghi ²

Hakime Aghaei ³

Seyed Mosa Tabatabaee ⁴

¹ Department of Psychology, Shahroud Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shahrood, Iran.

² Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Humanities and Arts, Professor of Accounting, Islamic Azad University, Tafresh, Iran.

³ Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Humanities, Shahroud Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shahrood, Iran.

⁴ Department of Cognitive Sciences, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Semnan University, Semnan, Iran.

10.22059/japr.2025.367877.644775

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to effectiveness of emotion-focused therapy on worry and uncertainty intolerance in patients with generalized anxiety disorder. This semi-experimental study was conducted with a pretest-posttest design with control group and follow-up 2 month. The statistical population of the present study was all patients with generalized anxiety in Tehran in 2023. In the first stage, the number of 30 patients with a score of 10 and above on the generalized anxiety disorder scale was selected and then randomly divided into one experimental group (15 patients) and one control group (15 patients) were replaced and experimental group underwent emotion-focused therapy, but the control group received no training and remained in the waiting list. To collect data generalized anxiety disorder scale (GAD-7), Penn State worry and uncertainty intolerance questionnaire (PSWQ) and intolerance of uncertainty scale (IUS-27). Data analysis was performed using SPSS-28 software with analysis of variance with repeated measures and Bonferroni. The results of the study showed that of emotion-focused therapy had a significant effect on worry and uncertainty intolerance (P<0.05).

Keywords

Emotion-Focused Therapy

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Uncertainty Intolerance

Worry