Objectives
The aim of the study was to examine mediating effects of emotion regulation and sport-specific dispositional mindfulness on self-rated athletic training performance, following the Mindfulness-Acceptance-Commitment (MAC) intervention, compared to a Psychological Skills Training (PST) control group.
Methods
Sixty-nine competitive elite athletes who did not have any prior experience with mindfulness- and acceptance-based exercises, were recruited and randomly assigned into either a MAC group or a traditional PST group. Latent growth curve analyses were performed to examine longitudinal relationships among the study variables. Mediation analyses were conducted to test if the growth trajectory of each of the proposed mediators mediated the relationship between the intervention and perceived performance (measured at T3).
Results
Findings showed that the MAC intervention had an indirect effect on self-rated athletic training performance through changes in dispositional mindfulness and emotion regulation respectively. Further, the MAC-group obtained greater post-test improvements in athletic mindfulness, emotion regulation abilities, and perceived performance compared to the PST group.
Conclusions
Overall, findings suggest that dispositional athletic mindfulness and emotion regulation may function as important mechanisms in MAC, and that the MAC approach is a more effective intervention compared to the PST condition in reducing emotion regulation difficulties, as well as enhancing sport-relevant mindfulness skills and perceived athletic training performance in elite sport.
The main objective of the project was to examine a proposed theoretical model of mindfulness mechanisms in sports. We conducted two studies (the first study using a cross-sectional design and the second a longitudinal design) to investigate if rumination and emotion regulation mediate the relation between dispositional mindfulness and sport-specific coping. Two hundred and forty-two young elite athletes, drawn from various sports, were recruited for the cross-sectional study. For the longitudinal study, 65 elite athletes were recruited. All analyses were performed using Bayesian statistics. The path analyses showed credible indirect effects of dispositional mindfulness on coping via rumination and emotion regulation in both the cross-sectional study and the longitudinal study. Additionally, the results in both studies showed credible direct effects of dispositional mindfulness on rumination and emotion regulation. Further, credible direct effects of emotion regulation as well as rumination on coping were also found in both studies. Our findings support the theoretical model, indicating that rumination and emotion regulation function as essential mechanisms in the relation between dispositional mindfulness and sport-specific coping skills. Increased dispositional mindfulness in competitive athletes (i.e. by practicing mindfulness) may lead to reductions in rumination, as well as an improved capacity to regulate negative emotions. By doing so, athletes may improve their sport-related coping skills, and thereby enhance athletic performance. © The Author(s) 2017.
A well established notion in Buddhist literature is that meditation practice improves the ability to be mindful in daily life which in turn promotes psychological well-being. In order to test this hypothesis the relations between meditation experience, five mindfulness facets and psychological well-being were studied in a sample consisting of Buddhist meditators, Western mindfulness meditators and non-meditators. The meditators scored higher than non-meditators on all mindfulness facets except Describe, but when age and gender were controlled for there were significant differences only on Non-React and Observe. Multiple and simple mediation were tested in a path model framework. Length of meditation experience was related to Non-React and Observe, and there was a similar trend also for Non-Judge, suggesting that these mindfulness facets are the ones most strongly associated with mindfulness meditation practice. The multiple mediation analysis showed an indirect effect of meditation experience on psychological wellbeing via the five mindfulness facets. Simple mediation analyses indicated that Non-React was the primary mediator. These results support the notion that length of meditation experience is related to higher levels of mindfulness, which in turn is associated with improved well-being.
The majority of mindfulness intervention studies do not include active control groups. To examine potential unique effects of mindfulness practice and to study the mechanism responsible for beneficial mental health effects associated with mindfulness-based interventions, the present study compared mindfulness meditation with an active control group in a randomised controlled trial. A short-term mindfulness-based intervention (n = 46) was compared with both an active control group—relaxation training (n = 40)—and an inactive wait-list group (n = 40) on self-reported mindfulness and decentering, executive attention, psychological well-being, anxiety, depression, and coping style, in an adult working population with no prior meditation experience. Analyses of covariance showed that the mindfulness group scored higher than the wait-list group on self-reported mindfulness and psychological well-being. However, no differences were found on decentering, anxiety, depression, executive attention, or coping style. Moreover, the study failed to distinguish any unique mindfulness effects since there were no differences between mindfulness and relaxation on any of the variables. Simple mediation analyses, using a bootstrap approach, revealed that decentering acted as a mediator between self-reported mindfulness and psychological well-being. The length of the intervention, the similarities between body scan exercises in MBI and relaxation, and the absence of decentering effects may partly explain the lack of distinct MBI effects, suggesting that MBIs aimed at increasing well-being and problem-focused coping whilst reducing psychological symptoms in a working population should be longer than merely 4 weeks and include more than seven sessions. © 2012 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
One of the most comprehensive measures of mindfulness is the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ) with five factors-Observing, Describing, Acting with awareness, Non-judging, and Non-reactivity. Hierarchical confirmatory factor analyses, however, have suggested that only four of the FFMQ factors (i.e. all except Observing) were components of "an overall mindfulness construct"-which is puzzling because Observing represents a core aspect of all definitions of mindfulness. The purpose of the present study was to approach this problem by a person-oriented approach, focusing on patterns on the FFMQ scales, rather than linear associations between them. Data on the FFMQ were collected on 817 individuals. Cluster analysis according to the LICUR procedure was used to group these participants in 13 clusters, according to their profiles of scores on the five FFMQ scales. Of the participants, 325 were categorized as meditators and 317 as non-meditators. To test hypotheses about the relation between Observing and mindfulness (which we assumed should be higher among meditators), the meditators/non-meditators categorization was cross-tabulated with the FFMQ clusters. The results showed that all clusters in which meditators were over-represented had high scores on Observing, and all clusters in which meditators were under-represented had low scores on Observing-which supports the hypothesis that mindfulness is related to high levels of Observing. The relationship between Observing and Non-judging, however, was found to be more complex than expected. The results are discussed in terms of mindfulness seen as a multidimensional skill, which may develop differently in various subgroups of individuals.