Investigation of the effectiveness of short-term grief-focused group intervention for 1st degree losses in earthquake

Abstract

A considerable number of individuals who lost family members in the 2023 earthquake in Hatay province, Turkey, have been found to experience a range of psychosocial problems and disorders. In this randomised controlled trial, the efficacy of grief-focused group therapy was compared with that of a control group that did not receive any treatment. A total of 10 Turkish adults were randomly assigned to the group therapy group. The participants were evaluated at the outset of the study and at its conclusion in order to ascertain any changes in psychological resilience (Psychological Resilience Scale for Adults), grief symptoms (Grief Scale), and cognitive flexibility (Cognitive Flexibility Inventory). The results of the study are as follows: The results demonstrated that grief-focused group therapy was an effective intervention for reducing grief symptoms and enhancing psychological resilience and cognitive flexibility. A brief grief-focused group intervention has been demonstrated to be an efficacious intervention for earthquake survivors. The brief grief-focused group intervention proved more efficacious than the control condition in enhancing psychological resilience and cognitive flexibility, while concurrently attenuating grief symptoms, among adults who lost first-degree family members in the earthquake. Overall, the Grief Recovery Focused Group Therapy Program yielded a favourable impact on alpha, beta, and gamma scores in the experimental group, while exhibiting no discernible effect on delta and theta scores.