The effectiveness of silva-style psychomotor relaxation on cognitive functions in people with generalized anxiety disorder

Anxiety disorders are one of the most common classes of psychiatric disorders worldwide. There are various models for the formation and persistence of this disorder that indicate the importance of this disorder among many emotional disorders in recent decades; Cognitive function is one of the cases in which generalized anxiety disorder can greatly affect. The effectiveness of silva-style psychomotor relaxation on cognitive functions in people with a generalized anxiety disorder. The research method was quasi-experimental with a pre-test post-test design and a control group. The statistical population of the study consisted of all individuals referring to counseling and psychotherapy centers in Tehran in the first six months of 2017. After initial evaluation using the Pervasive Anxiety Disorder Scale, 30 of them were selected by purposive sampling method and randomly assigned to experimental (n= 15) and control (n= 15) groups. Silva-style psycho-relaxation group therapy was performed on the experimental group in 8 sessions of 90 minutes (two sessions per week); The control group was placed on a waiting list for one month. In order to collect information, the Pervasive Anxiety Disorder Scale (Spitz, et al., 2006) and the Wisconsin Card Test (Grant & Berg, 1984) were used in two stages: pre-test and post-test. Analysis of covariance was used to analyze the data. Findings showed that after controlling the effect of the pretest, there was a significant difference between the mean scores of cognitive function components including success and achievement in the experimental and control groups (P<0.005). In general, according to the results of the study, it can be said that the silva-style psychosomatic intervention has an effect on improving the cognitive functions of people with a generalized anxiety disorder.