The effect of cognitive behavioral oriented psycho education program on dealing with loneliness : an online psychological counseling approach

Abstract

Loneliness is a very cotnmon problem which incorporates many disorders. The inadequacy of services to treat this problem makes it necessary to develop new treatment methods. For this purpose, it was aimed to test the effect of online psychological cotmseling on dealing with loneliness problem in this research. The research includes the study with experimental-control group and pretest posttest pattem. In the study, the experimental group was applied Cognitive behavioral psycho education program which is influential in dealing with loneliness. The application was carried out via msn (Windows Live Messenger) program between the participants and the counselor. UCLA loneliness scale was used to collect data in the study which took 12 weeks. At the end of the study, it was concluded that there is a sigtiificant decrease in loneliness level of the participants and online psychological counseling is an eflScient method in dealing with loneliness. As a result, although online psychological counseling is not an application which can substitute for faceto- face consulting, it is an altemative method in dealing with loneliness problem.