Social Anxiety in Students with Learning Disability: Benefits of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy

Objective: The present study was conducted to examine the effectiveness of ‘Acceptance and Commitment Therapy’ (ACT) on reducing social anxiety in students with learning disability. Methods: In this experimental research, pretest-posttest and control group were utilized. Population of this study included all the middle-school male students with learning disability in Koohdasht City (2013-2014). The sample included 40 male students with learning disability who were randomly selected after structured clinical interview. Subjects were randomly put into experimental group and control group (20 individuals each). Instruments of this research included structured clinical interview, Raven IQ Test (1962), and Watson & Friend’s Anxiety Scale (1969). Pretest and posttest were administered for both groups. Experimental group received acceptance and commitment therapy model for 10 1-hour sessions, while the control group received no intervention. To analyze the data, Multivariate Analysis of Variance test (MANOVA) was used. Statistical Package for Social Science 16 (SPSS 16) program was used for statistical analysis. Results: The results of MANOVA showed that acceptance and commitment therapy model training has been effective on decreasing social anxiety in students with learning disability (P<0.001). The findings also showed that there is a significant difference in social anxiety between control group and experimental group. Conclusion: According to the findings of this study, acceptance and commitment therapy model training reduces social anxiety in students with learning disability and it is possible to make use of this model as a suitable intervention method.