Background and purpose: Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterized by difficulty in social functioning, communication, and the presence of stereotypic and repetitive behaviors. Due to various problems of these children, their families, especially their mothers experience extreme stress. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of cognitive behavioral therapy on mental health and irrational beliefs of mothers with autistic children.

Materials and methods: In this study a quasi-experimental design including pre-test, post-test and control group was used. First, a sample size of 30 women with autistic children were selected and tested. In pre-test, the Goldberg General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28) and Jones Irrational Beliefs Test (IBT) were administered individually to experimental group (n = 15) and control group (n = 15). Then, cognitive behavioral therapy (consisting of ten weekly 75-minute sessions) was conducted in experimental group whereas no intervention was done in control group. After the intervention, the general health and irrational beliefs were measured again.

Results: The MANCOVA analysis showed that cognitive behavioral therapy was effective in reducing irrational beliefs in experimental group (179.45±20.64) (P<0.0001). Also, the intervention improved the scores for general health among experimental group (36.06±10.92) (P<0.0001).

Conclusion: Cognitive behavioral therapy as a useful therapeutic intervention could be of benefit in improving mental health and irrational beliefs in mothers with autistic children.