Background: A review of previous studies has shown that psychological factors such as disease acceptance and emotional self-regulation have a significant effect on the exacerbation of irritable bowel syndrome and its therapeutic consequences. Among the effective methods for increasing disease acceptance and improving emotional self-regulation, we can mention relaxation training and awareness and emotional expression training.
Aims: The present study was conducted with the aim of comparing the efficacy of relaxation training and awareness and emotional expression training on disease acceptance and emotional self-regulation in patients with irritable bowel syndrome.
Methods: The current research design was a semi-experimental pre-test-post-test type with a control group and a two-month follow-up. The statistical population of the study included all patients with irritable bowel syndrome who referred to the gastroenterology Subspecialty offices in northwest Tehran from 2021 to July 2022, who had received the diagnostic criteria of irritable bowel syndrome. Using the purposeful sampling, 60 patients with irritable bowel syndrome were selected, And then they were randomly divided into three groups of 20 people (two experimental groups and one control group). The tools used in this research was the Chronic Illness Acceptance Questionnair (Beacham et al., 2015) and Emotional self-regulation (affective style) questionnaire (Hofmann & Kashdan, 2010). Also, for the first experimental group, relaxation training, For the second experimental group, awareness and emotional expression training in 8 sessions of 90 minutes it was held virtually. In order to analyze the research data, the Analysis of variance with repeated measures and SPSS-26 software was used.
Results: The findings showed that compared to relaxation training, awareness and emotional expression training increase disease acceptance in people with irritable bowel syndrome. The difference in the efficacy of relaxation and awareness and emotional expression on the components of commitment to engaging in activities (P= 0.004) and Willingness to endure (P= 0.034) and consequently on the total score of disease acceptance (P= 0.001) was significant. Also, the results showed that relaxation training is not an effective method for improving emotional self-regulation in patients with irritable bowel syndrome, however, the difference between the effect of relaxation training and awareness and emotional expression training on the factors of adjusting (P= 0.011), concealing (P= 0.001) and tolerating (P= 0.008) is significant.
Conclusion: Based on the findings of the present study, it seems awareness and emotional expression training is a more effective method to increase disease acceptance and improve emotional self-regulation in irritable bowel syndrome patients compared to relaxation training.