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Psychodrama and the Emotional State of Women Dealing with Infertility

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Abstract

This study aims to investigate the effects of psychodrama on feelings of depression, anxiety, and hopelessness, as well as the level of self-esteem in female patients with infertility. The study sample consisted of 30 female patients with infertility, who applied to the In Vitro Fertilisation Unit of a university hospital in Ankara. Initially, Beck’s Depression Inventory, Beck’s Anxiety Inventory, Beck’s Hopelessness Scale, and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale were administered to recruited patients twice, before and after the start of the psychodrama practice. 8 weeks of psychodrama were practised with the sample group for 3 h per week. In each group session, the aim was for women to acknowledge their emotions and share their challenges during the infertility treatment process through psychodrama games. The IBM SPSS Statistics 21.0 program (Istanbul, Turkey), Shapiro–Wilk test, Mann–Whitney U test, and Wilcoxon test were used for statistical analysis and calculation. The results showed significant differences between participants’ pre and post-test scores on Beck’s Depression, Beck’s Anxiety, Beck’s Hopelessness, and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. However, there was no significant difference between participants’ pre and post-test scores on Beck’s Anxiety Inventory; post-test scores were lower than pre-test scores. It was shown that group therapy for female patients with infertility. This result shows that psychodrama may enhance self-esteem, despair, anxiety and depression.

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Funding

This work was partially funded by the researchers.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Nursing, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University, Ankara, Turkey

    Candan Terzioğlu & Birgül Özkan

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  1. Candan Terzioğlu
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  2. Birgül Özkan
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Correspondence to Candan Terzioğlu.

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Both authors declares that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

All of the procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed Consent

Online informed consent was stated and therefore obtained from all individual participants included in the study. No sensitive or identifiable data were collected for the purpose of this study.

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Terzioğlu, C., Özkan, B. Psychodrama and the Emotional State of Women Dealing with Infertility. Sex Disabil 36, 87–99 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11195-017-9514-8

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