The effectiveness of acceptance and commitment therapy and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy in the fear of negative evaluation on social anxiety clinical syndrome

Abstract

Social anxiety disorder is a kind of chronic and general anxiety disorders and fear of negative evaluation is one of the effective cognitive dysfunctions in the formation of social anxiety. The purpose of this research was to study the effectiveness of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) on anxiety sensitivity in social anxiety clinical syndrome. The method of present study was semi-experimental (pre-test __ post-test) with control group. Therefore, 60 female subjects were selected based on structured diagnostic interview of DSM-5 and targeted sampling method assigned to two groups: acceptance and commitment therapy (N=20), cognitive therapy based on mind-fullness (N=20) and control group (N=20). The Social Phobia Inventory (SPIN) and Brief Form of Negative Evaluation Scale fear questionnaire (BFNE-S) were assessed for gathering data. Multivariate analysis of covariance was used to analyze the results. The results indicated that there was a significant difference between the two groups of interventional therapy based on acceptance and cognitive therapy based on mindfulness and control group in the difference between the pre-test and post-test scores of fear of negative evaluation (P < 0/01). Overall, the results of this study indicated that both the method of treatment based on acceptance and commitment and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy had an effect upon reducing anxiety sensitivity in clinical syndrome of university students' social anxiety.