Can clinical psychology students benefit from brief and intensive mindfulness training?

摘要

This pilot study examined the impact of mindfulness training on skills relevant for the well-being and therapeutic functioning of clinical psychology students. Twentyfive psychology students took part in an intensive mindfulness training programme, consisting of three 2.5-hr sessions and one all-day silent retreat. The students filled out self-report measures of rumination, emotional reactivity to stress, difficulties with emotion regulation, mindfulness and self-compassion. They also completed two cognitive tests (revised version of the Attention Network Test and a Stroop colourword inference task) before and after the course. The students reported significant decreases in rumination (d = 0.75, p =.001), emotional reactivity to stress (d = 0.81, p =.001) and difficulties in emotion regulation (d = 0.57, p =.008). They also reported increased mindfulness (d = 0.93, p =.001) and self-compassion (d = 0.81, p =.001). On both cognitive performance tests, the students showed an increase in executive control, that is the ability to prioritise among competing thoughts, feelings and responses (ANT, d = 1.48; p =.001; Stroop: d = 0.63; p =.004). The students also showed a moderate increase in cognitive flexibility (d = 0.66; p =.003), measured by Stroop.