the effectiveness of play therapy with life skills approach on separation anxiety syndrome in preschool children

Introduction: the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of play therapy with life skills approach on reducing separation anxiety syndrome in preschool children.materials and methods: the statistical population of this study was all the leading preschool students with separation anxiety disorder in mashhad city-iran in the academic year of 2018-2019. based on cochran’s formula, 30 children were selected by the convenient sampling method and were randomly divided into two groups of experimental (n= 15) and control (n= 15). the separation anxiety scale (hahn et al. 2003) was used to collect information. the experimental group was also trained in play therapy with a life skills approach based on vernon model (2006) in 10 ninety-minute sessions. data analyzed through multivariate analysis of covariance.results: the results showed that there was a significant difference between two groups in score of separation anxiety syndrome and its components in the post-test stage (p< 0.05).conclusion: the findings of the present study showed that play therapy with a life skills approach can be used to reduce separation anxiety syndrome in preschool children.