The effectiveness of Imago therapy on perspective taking and forgiveness among women damaged by marital infidelity

Introduction: Marital infidelity is a painful event for women that threaten the family system. The most important variables associated with marital infidelity are included perspective taking and forgiveness. So present research aimed to investigation the effectiveness of imago therapy on perspective taking and forgiveness among women damaged by marital infidelity. Methods: This quasi-experimental study was done with a pre-test and post-test by a control group. Statistical population included all women damaged by marital infidelity that referred to counseling centers of Ahvaz city in 2016 year. Totally 30 women were selected by available sampling method and randomly assigned to two equal group (each group 15 person). The experimental group training (8 sessions of 90 minutes) by imago therapy method and the control group didn’t receive any treatment. Both groups were evaluated using the questionnaires of Longs’ perspective taking and Pollard & Colleagues’ forgiveness as a pre-test and post-test. Data were analyzed by one-variable covariance method and with assistance SPSS-22 software. Results: The results of the findings showed that there is significant difference between the experimental and control groups on perspective taking and forgiveness. In other words, imago therapy led to significant increase on perspective taking and forgiveness in women damaged by marital infidelity (P<0/05). Conclusion: According to the results, it can be suggested that counselors and therapists use therapeutic communication as an intervention to reduce the problems of women affected by marital infidelity