The Effectiveness of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy on Reducing Stress in Female Students with Social Anxiety

hoseinian, masoomeh; mohammadifar, fatemeh

Volume 19, Issue 2 (Volume19, Issue 2 2025) 2025, 19(2): 196-215 | Back to browse issues page

Mendeley

Zotero

RefWorks

hoseinian M, mohammadifar F. The Effectiveness of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy on Reducing Stress in Female Students with Social Anxiety. Research in psychological health 2025; 19 (2) :196-215
URL: http://rph.khu.ac.ir/article-1-4754-en.html

The Effectiveness of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy on Reducing Stress in Female Students with Social Anxiety

Masoomeh Hoseinian¹

, Fatemeh Mohammadifar

1- , Hoseinian_1342@yahoo.com

Abstract: (1249 Views)

The aim of the present study was to investigate the effectiveness of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (ISTDP) on reducing perceived stress in female students with social anxiety. The research method was quasi-experimental with a pretest–posttest design and a control group. The statistical population included seventh-grade female students of lower secondary schools in District 3 of Tehran during the 2024–2025 academic year. The sample consisted of 20 students with symptoms of social anxiety who were selected through purposive sampling and randomly assigned into experimental and control groups (10 students in each group). The experimental group received 9 sessions of 90-minute Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy, while the control group did not receive any intervention. The research instruments included the Social Phobia Inventory (SPIN) and the Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21). Data were analyzed using analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) in SPSS-26 software.
The results showed that after controlling for the pretest effect, there was a significant difference between the two groups in perceived stress (p < 0.01). The effect size was 0.569, indicating a considerable effectiveness of the intervention. The findings indicated that Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy can significantly reduce stress in female students with social anxiety.

Keywords: Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy, perceived stress, social anxiety, female students, adolescence