The Persian Checklist of Pleasant Events (PCPE): ‎Development, Validity and Reliability

Objective: Experiencing ‎pleasant events during daily life ‎has a significant positive role in ‎the personal mental health and ‎acts as a keystone for “behavioral ‎activation” (BA) interventions. ‎There are serious differences in ‎the pleasant event schedules in ‎different cultures and countries. ‎We aimed to develop a Persian ‎checklist of pleasant events ‎‎(PCPE) to provide and validate a ‎culturally compatible checklist for ‎Iranians.‎ Methods: To develop a checklist ‎of pleasant events, inspired by ‎Pleasant Events Schedule (PES) ‎‎(MacPhillamy & Lewinsohn, ‎‎1982), we held three focused ‎group discussions with 24 normal ‎healthy participants from both ‎genders (female = 12) and asked ‎them to mention as much ‎pleasant events as possible. ‎When the list reached saturation ‎level, the inappropriate items with ‎respect to legal, cultural and ‎religious concerns were omitted. ‎The final checklist of PCPE ‎consists of two subscales: ‎Frequency (frequency of events ‎during last month) and ‎pleasantness (perceived ‎pleasantness of events). The total ‎score consists of frequency ‎multiplied by pleasantness. To ‎test the reliability and validity of ‎the checklist, the PCPE, ‎Depression, Anxiety and Stress ‎Scale (DASS), the Persian ‎version of WHO Quality of Life ‎and the Demographic ‎Questionnaire were administered ‎in a sample of 104 participants ‎‎(50 male and 54 female).‎ Results: Frequency, ‎pleasantness and the total scores ‎of PCPE showed high levels of ‎internal consistency (Cronbach’s ‎alpha, .976, .976 & .974, ‎respectively). Further support for ‎the convergent validity of the ‎PCPE was obtained via ‎moderate negative correlations ‎with depression, anxiety, stress ‎scores in DASS and positive ‎correlation with quality of life as ‎well as respondent’s perceived ‎happiness. There were negative ‎correlations between frequency, ‎pleasantness and total scores ‎and age of the participants ‎‎(Pearson correlation coefficient, r ‎‎= -.194, p<0.05; r = -.270, p<0.01 ‎& r = -.234, p<0.05, respectively).‎ Conclusion‏:‏‎ PCPE as an ‎assessment tool has shown to ‎have good reliability and validity ‎among Iranians. Further steps ‎should be taken to validate this ‎instrument in different ‎psychopathologies such as ‎depression, addiction and ‎obesity

On the Comparison of the Therapeutic Effects of Matrix Treatment on Severity of Addiction and Mental Health between Female and Male Methamphetamine Abusers

Objective: This study was an attempt to compare the therapeutic effects of matrix treatment on the severity of addiction and mental health between female and male methamphetamine abusers. Method: From among 121 patients admitted in maintenance treatment centers, 91 patients who met the conditions required for participation in this study were selected and randomly assigned to two separate groups based on gender (female=43 and male=48). In the following, 9 males and 4 females were excluded from the study. Mental Health and Addiction Severity Index was administered to both groups before and after the intervention. Results: The results were indicative of no significant difference in any of the subscales of addiction severity between female and male abusers after treatment. However, the difference in mental health scores was statistically significant. Males experienced an increase in depression in comparison with females whereas females underwent higher levels of anxiety than males. Conclusion: Matrix treatment shows significantly different effects on mental health of females and males