Investigation of the Effect of Islamic-Iranian Contentment Protocol on Subjective Well-being and Physical Health

Background and Purpose: Contentment is one of the moral virtues that has been considered in Islamic and Iranian sources; however, this virtue has been faded drastically these days. According to the literature, mental well-being and physical health are expected to have effects on contentment. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the effect of an increase in contentment based on Iranian-Islamic sources on mental well-being and physical health. Materials and Methods: This quasi-experimental study was conducted with three groups using a pre-test, post-test, and follow-up. In total, 36 individuals were purposefully selected from seminary students in Qom and undergraduate students at Mazandaran University, Iran, and randomly divided into two experimental and one control groups. The two experimental groups received the protocol of an increase in the contentment using Iranian-Islamic content. All participants completed the Mental Well-Being Questionnaire (Mental Happiness Scale and Life Satisfaction Scale) and the Physical Health Sub-Scale of the World Health Organization Quality of Life-BREF Questionnaire in three stages. Results: Results of analysis of variance with repeated measures showed an improvement in the mental well-being of both groups of students after intervention and follow-up, compared to the control group. However, unlike the seminary student group, the implementation of the contentment protocol did not increase the physical health of the university student group, compared to the control group. Conclusion: The findings of this study showed that an improvement in positive human virtues, such as contentment and education of these virtues, could have a positive effect on the components of mental health, including mental well-being and physical health.