Communication apprehension and Morita therapy: Evaluation of a brief Morita therapy workshop against a stress management education workshop.

摘要

The present study investigated effectiveness of a 3 session psychoeducational Morita therapy workshop vs. a 3 session stress management education (SME) workshop on communication apprehension in 31 subjects (24 males, 7 females, mean age = 32.3 years) at a United States Air Force station. Communication apprehension was measured multimodally, with self-report, behavioral, heart rate, and generalization measurements at pretreatment, posttreatment, and five week follow-up. Results indicated significant but small effect sizes for both treatments on self-report and behavioral measurements, a reduction in social avoidance from pretreatment to follow-up, and non-significant effects on heart rate. Morita and SME treatments did not differ in effectiveness. Several limitations are discussed, including low baseline levels of communication apprehension and potentially inadequate scripted speeches.