The Effectiveness of T Trauma-Focused ACT on Depression Symptoms and Distress Tolerance in Students with a History of Love Trauma

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Educational Sciences and Psychology, Azarbaijan Shahid Madani University, Tabriz, Iran

2 Associate professor, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Educational Sciences and Psychology, Azarbaijan Shahid Madani University, Tabriz, Iran

Abstract

Objective: The purpose of the present study was evaluation of the effectiveness of Trauma-Focused ACT on depression symptoms and distress tolerance in students with experience of love trauma.
Method: The research followed a quasi-experimental design with a pretest-posttest and three-month follow-up, including a control group. The statistical population consisted of university students in Kermanshah who had experienced love trauma in 2024. Using convenience sampling, 28 participants were selected and randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. Beck Depression Inventory–II (Beck et al 1996) and Distress Tolerance Scale (Simons and Gaher, 2005) were administered at three time points: pretest, posttest, and follow-up. The experimental group received ten 75-minute sessions of Trauma-Focused ACT based on Harris's (2021) protocol. Data were analyzed using repeated measures ANOVA.
Results: The results showed that the effects of time and the time × group interaction on the dependent variables were significant at the 0.001 level, while the effect of group was significant at the 0.05 level. The Bonferroni post-hoc test for comparing means showed that the difference in means in the experimental group at the pre-test - post-test and pre-test - follow-up stages was statistically significant (p < 0.05). But it is not significant at the post-test follow-up stage (p> 0.05).
Conclusion: The findings suggest that Trauma-Focused ACT as an effective therapeutic approach can be utilized by psychotherapists to reduce depressive symptoms and increase distress tolerance.

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

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Applied Psychology
Volume 19, Issue 3 - Serial Number 75
September 2025
Pages 55-80

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