The Effectiveness of Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy on the Psychological Symptoms of Students with Social Anxiety Disorder: A Randomized Clinical Trial

Abstract Introduction: Social anxiety is a prevalent disorder among university students which interferes with their functions. Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy is one of the new approaches for treating psychological disorders. This research aims to study the effectiveness of group mindfulness-based cognitive therapy in university students suffering from social anxiety. Method: The design of this study was quasi-experimental with pretest, posttest and follow-up assessments for control and intervention groups. For this purpose, 24 students diagnosed with social anxiety were randomly allocated to control and intervention groups. The intervention group received 8 sessions of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. The students completed the Social Interaction Anxiety Scale (SIAS), Interpersonal Sensitivity Measure (IPSM) and the Self-Compassion Scale (SCS) in both pretest and posttest. Follow-up assessments were done after 2 months. The data were analyzed using SPSS. Results: According to the findings of the present study, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy reduces social anxiety and interpersonal sensitivity significantly. Also, it can increase the components of self-compassion significantly in the intervention group compared to the control group. Conclusion: Due to the effectiveness of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy in reducing social anxiety in students, considering and utilizing this kind of psychotherapy is of great importance.