en رويكرد شناختي رفتاري Cognitive behavioral پژوهشي Original Research Article <p dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify"><strong>Objective: </strong>This study aimed to investigate the mediating role of maladaptive schemas between&nbsp;childhood emotional maltreatment and psychological distress among college students.<br> <strong>Methods: </strong>This was a descriptive-correlative and after the fact study. A total of 315 students&nbsp;were selected with multistage cluster sampling from students of Tehran universities. The&nbsp;participants completed the lifetime of experiences questionnaire (LEQ), Young&rsquo;s schema&nbsp;questionnaire short form with 90-item (YSQ-SF-3), and the trauma symptom checklist-40&nbsp;(TSC-40). Data were analyzed by path analysis using SPSS 16.<br> <strong>Results: </strong>The results indicated that perception of childhood emotional maltreatment was&nbsp;associated with later psychological distress and mediated through schema of defectiveness/&nbsp;shame, vulnerability to harm, self-sacrifice, and entitlement.<br> <strong>Conclusion:</strong> In this study, our findings suggested that childhood emotional maltreatment is&nbsp;contributed to later psychological distress by developing cognitive vulnerability of children&nbsp;through maladaptive schemas. These schemas are rigid and extreme cognitive structures that&nbsp;negatively filter and bias cognitive and emotional information.</p> Childhood emotional maltreatment, Psychological distress, Early maladaptive schemas, College students 209 217 http://jpcp.uswr.ac.ir/browse.php?a_code=A-10-274-1&slc_lang=en&sid=1 Shirin Farazmand farazmand.sn@gmail.com No Organization Parveneh Mohammadkhani parmohamir@yahoo.com Yes Department of Clinical Psychology, University of Social Welfare and Rehabilitation Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Abbas Pourshahbaz apourshahbaz@yahoo.com No Assistant Professor Behrooz Dolatshahi dolatshahee@yahoo.com No Assistant Professor