ABSTRACT

The main tenet of the Expressive Writing procedure is that by disclosing stress related emotions and thoughts in writing, one may experience improved physical and psychological health. The main purpose of the present study was to investigate the differentiated effect of two Expressive Writing tasks on female freshmen: the classic task and the classic task enhanced with REBT. Our results indicate that both tasks succeed to significantly reduce levels of depression, nevertheless, only the classic task enhanced with REBT is able to enhance other aspects of the affective life as well. On the other hand, neither task is able to induce significant increases in positive affect.

KEYWORDS: emotional disclosure, expressive writing, REBT.

PAGES: 251-264