The Effectiveness of Existential Therapy Intervention on Anxiety Caused by Coronavirus and Death

The coronavirus outbreak developed a worldwide critical public hygiene issue that threatens physical and mental health and public safety. The present research aimed to address the effectiveness of the existential therapy approach on the anxiety caused by death and the coronavirus in the victims' families. The current research was a clinical semi-experimental study with a pre-test and post-test design and a control group. The study's statistical population included all clients who visited Isfahan's Welfare Organization in the last semester of 2020. From this population, a sample of thirty clients who satisfied the research entry criteria was selected using the convenience sampling method, and the members were divided into an experimental and a control group. Then, the control group received a ten-session existential treatment. The examinees were assessed using the Death Anxiety Scale and the COVID-19 Anxiety Scale. Eventually, the data were analyzed using descriptive statistics (the mean and the standard deviation) and inferential statistics (covariance Analysis and Multivariate Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance) using SPSS. The research findings indicated that the effectiveness of existential psychotherapy intervention in decreasing the physical anxiety resulting from the coronavirus was not significant. However, it effectively reduced the mean dimensions of the anxiety caused by death and the mental anxiety resulting from the coronavirus (P >000/1).