[Early maladaptive schemas and psychological health among women's seeking cosmetic surgery]

Introduction: Identifying the psychological factors is a major contributor in the management of applicants of cosmetic surgery. This study was conducted to investigate the early maladaptive schemas and general health among people seeking cosmetic surgery

Methods: This study is a descriptive-analytical and comparative study. The population of this study was the combination of patients referring to beauty clinic and some people in Isfahan City. Participants included two groups of 60 [120 individuals] who were applicants for cosmetic surgery and non-applicants which selected through convenience sampling method. In this study data collection was made through using maladaptive schemas questionnaire [SF-YSQ] and general health [GHQ-28]. Data analysis was carried out through using SPSS 18, descriptive statistics and MANOVA test

Results: There was a significant difference between applicant and non-applicant of cosmetic surgery concerning the early maladaptive schemas [P=0.02, F=3.34]. Results of MANOVA test showed the difference between the two groups in terms of schemas disconnection/rejection [P=0.002, F=12.19], autonomy [P=0.001, F=15.14], impaired limits [P=0.016, F=6.55] and other-directedness [P=0.003, F=10.79], but there is no significant difference between the two groups of ear ringing. Also, there are significant differences between applicant and non-applicant groups in terms of public health [P=0.04, F=5.05]. The two groups had significant difference in terms of Physical status [P=0.033, F=5.03], depression [P=0.001, F=14.92] and anxiety [P=0.009, F=8.01], but the difference of social performance was not statistically significant

Conclusion: Based on the identification of early maladaptive schemas and general health problems of women applicants of cosmetic surgery in current study, providing psychological treatment especially schema therapy before surgery is recommended

[Studying the psychometric properties of marital attitude scale]

Attitude toward marriage is one of the key mechanisms in anticipating real behavior in marriage and its assessment needs a valid instrument. The aim of this research was to investigate the reliability, validity, and factor structure of Persian version of Marital Attitude Scale [MAS, Brateen and Rosen, 1998]. In this descriptive-scaling research, the study population of this research was the B.A students studying at Isfahan University. The sample was 137 university students [including 51 males and 86 females] selected by stratified sampling. Marital Attitude Scale [MAS] and Marriage Expectation Scale [MES] were the instruments for collecting the data. Data were analyzed by factor analysis, MANOVA and Pearson correlation. The results showed that MAS has high and suitable reliability and validity for assessing university students' attitude toward marriage. The results of factor analysis revealed that MAS is a multidimentional instrument. Attitude toward marriage can be divided into two distinct and yet interrelated factors, attitude toward their marriage and general attitude toward marriage. The general attitude toward marriage includes pessimistic, optimistic and idealistic attitude. Furthermore, comparing the attitude of boys and girls, as a lateral finding, showed girls' attitude toward their marriage and general attitude toward marriage is more negative than boys, and girls have more pessimistic attitude toward marriage. In general, the marital attitude Scale is a reliable and suitable instrument to assess marital Attitudes

[Quality of life and its different domains in fertile and infertile women]

Background and Aim: Assessment of Quality Of Life[QOL] is one of the most active areas in modern studies. QOL is a term to describe individuals' health and affective, social and physical wellbeing and also to demonstrate their ability for accomplishing daily routine tasks

This study aimed to compare QOL domains in fertile and infertile women

Method and Materials: Forty-four infertile women referred to Isfahan Clinic of Fertility and Infertility and 35 fertile women were randomly selected. Participants' level of education considered to be at least graduation from intermediary school and their range of age to be 20 to 40. QOL questionnaire was administered to all participants. This questionnaire consists of 55 questions which assess the QOL in 5 domains namely: physical status, psychological and affective status, perceived stress, enjoying life and perceived overall QOL. Data analyses were done by SPSS software

Findings: Compared to fertile women, QOL mean score was significantly lower in infertile ones[p=0.02]. In the domains of physical status, perceived stress and perceived overall QOL, the two groups showed no significant difference [p > 0.05], but infertile women group had a significantly lower score on the domains of psychological- effective status[p = 0.02] and enjoying life[p = 0.0001]

Conclusion: QOL is one of the important issues to be addressed in infertility counseling

Attitude towards infertility and its relation to depression and anxiety in infertile couples

Different psychological aspects of infertility have been studied so far. The objecttive of this study was to determine the most common dimensions of attitude towards infertility in infertile couples and also to determine the relation between attitude towards infertility and age of couples, the time-span after marriage, educational achievements and infertility variables. Another objective of the study was to determine the relation between attitude towards infertility and degrees of depression and anxiety. Among people who referred to Fertility and Infertility Center in Isfahan in autumn 2004, 55 cases [25 men and 30 women], who had neither children nor any adoption child but had been diagnosed infertile, were randomly selected and were asked to answer attitude towards infertility questionnaire and Beck s depression and anxiety inventories. The data were analyzed by SPSS software. Statistical methods such as correlation, descriptive analysis, variance and multiple regression analyses were employed. Based on the findings of the study, attitude towards having offspring and parental role with 69.1%, and attitude towards social acceptance with 54.5%, were the most prevalent dimensions of attitude towards infertility. In addition, attitude had a significant [p<0.05] reverse relation to age but had no significant relation to time-span after marriage or the participants' educational levels. Results did not show significant differences in attitude towards infertility, when the participant, his/her spouse or both of them were infertile. Noting the regression analysis results, attitude towards life control and social acceptance are the most important factors determining depression severity [p<0.0001], where life control, social acceptance, having offspring and parental role had greater effects on anxiety [p<0.0001]. Many infertile couples put the highest emphasis on offspring and parental role and most of them had negative attitude towards social acceptance. Older people had less negative attitudes towards the variables. The participants' attitude towards infertility had no relation to timespan after marriage, educational levels or whether the participant, his/her spouse or both were infertile. Depression and anxiety in these couples were due to their attitude towards life control and social acceptance