Investigating the Effectiveness of Emotional Therapy Schema on Hidden Anger and Self-Expression of Women Victims of Domestic Violence

Aim and Background: In the last decade, violence against women has been mentioned as one of the most serious social challenges. The painful phenomenon of violence against women in its various dimensions endangers the physical and mental health of women and violates their human rights. Therefore, the current study was conducted with the aim of investigating the effectiveness of emotional therapy schema on hidden anger and self-expression of women victims of domestic violence. Methods and Materials: The research method was semi-experimental with a pre-test-post-test design and follow-up with a control group. The statistical population of the research consisted of women victims of domestic violence referred to the health centers of Flowerjan city in the summer of 2023. The statistical sample consisted of 30 women who were selected by Targeted sampling method and randomly assigned to experimental (15 people) and control (15 people) groups. The experimental group underwent emotional schema therapy for ten 90-minute sessions and the control group remained on the waiting list. A number of 30 people were assigned to the experimental group and the control group (15 people in each group) by the Purposive sampling method and by random assignment. The experimental group received emotional schema therapy during 11 sessions. While the control group did not receive any intervention. The data were collected using the latent communicative anger questionnaire (Nelson and Carroll, 2006) and self-expression (Gambrill and Ritchie, 1970) and were analyzed using repeated measures variance analysis in SPSS software version 23. Findings: The results showed that the emotional therapy scheme led to the reduction of hidden anger and improvement of self-expression in women victims of domestic violence, and the effects of the treatment remained in the follow-up phase as well (p