The effect of compassion-focused therapy on self-compassion and self-criticism in adolescents with body-image disorder

The current study aimed to determine the effect of compassion-focused therapy on self-compassion and self-criticism in adolescents with body-image disorder. This quasi-experimental study was a pretest-posttest with the control group consisting of 30 adolescents with a body-image disorder based on a purposeful sampling selected and randomly allocated to experimental (n=15) and control (n=15) groups. The experimental group was provided with 10 one-week CFT sessions, while the control group did not receive any treatment. At the start of the study, after 10 weeks, all participants were tested using the Self-Compassion Scale and the Levels of Self-criticism (LOSC) Scale. In addition to descriptive statistics, MANOVA was used to analyze the results and all analyses were carried out using SPSS-23 software. Based on the MANOVA, CFT was significantly more effective than non-treatment in reducing self-criticism (p < 0.05). Moreover, CFT was able to increase the self-compassion levels among individuals with the body-image disorder, significantly (p < 0.05). Consequently, we can conclude that the practice of compassion-focused therapy seems to be a promising area of intervention, not only for decreasing self-criticism but also for enhancing self-compassion among adolescents with body-image disorder.