investigation of the effectiveness of schema therapy on referential thinking and its aspects in nurses with job burnout

Background: this study aimed to examine the impact of referential thinking, cognitive fusion, and job burnout on individual functioning. objectives: this research also aimed to assess how schema therapy affects referential thinking and its different aspects in female nurses experiencing job burnout. additionally, this study explored the long-term duration of the effects of therapy. methods: this research employed a semi-experimental design with pre-test, post-test, and a 3-month follow-up phases. this study included all the female nursing staff at imam khomeini hospital in tehran, iran, from october to december 2021. random sampling was used to select 40 participants from the study population. the experimental group underwent eight 90-min sessions of schema therapy, while the control group received no intervention and remained on the waiting list. data were collected during the pre-test, post-test, and follow-up stages using the maslach burnout inventory and perseverative thinking questionnaire. data analysis was performed in spss software (version 24), encompassing descriptive and inferential statistics multivariate analysis of covariance, repeated measures analysis of variance, and bonferroni post hoc test. results: the results indicated that both mentioned treatments were significantly effective in reducing referential thinking and job burnout, compared to the control group at the post-test and follow-up stages (p<0.05). in addition to the effects of group and time, the interactive effect of group × time was significant for the key feature components (η2=0.340, p=0.001, f=13.13), perceived cognitive failures (η2=0.095, p=0.037, f=2.67), psychological capacity hijacking (η2=0.198, p=0.001, f=6.32), and overall score of referential thinking (η2=0.327, p=0.001, f=12.41). these findings indicated that the implementation of independent variables has significantly affected the components and overall score of referential thinking. conclusion: based on the findings, schema therapy can be used as a therapeutic approach to reduce referential thinking and job burnout in counseling centers and psychological services.