Solution-Focused Brief Therapy in Iran: A Scoping Review of the Outcome Literature

Purpose: A considerable body of research literature on solution-focused brief therapy (SFBT) with clinically diverse populations in Iran has emerged over the past 15 years but has yet to be comprehensively reviewed. This scoping review was conducted to synthesize literature evaluating SFBT interventions in Iran to identify key areas for potential evidence-based recommendations and focus future research priorities. Method: We reviewed the SFBT intervention literature using broad eligibility criteria to identify studies published before June 2020 in English or Persian/Farsi that investigated the effects of SFBT for populations in Iran. Two reviewers independently screened all potentially eligible references and completed data extraction for all eligible studies. Results: Of the 77 eligible outcome studies, 78% reported positive intervention effects for a wide range of applications across ages and fields of practice. Discussion: Our results demonstrate that solution-focused interventions in Iran are heterogeneous, and a wide variety of methodologies have been used to evaluate their effectiveness.