Brief mindfulness training in the social work practice classroom

Abstract

Social Work educators are increasingly concerned with discerning how to help students develop the affective, relational, and meta-cognitive skills needed for effective, resilient, and sustainable social work practice. A small but growing literature supports mindfulness training as a path to those ends. However, most mindfulness intervention studies, even those mentioning ‘brief intervention,’ have typically used fairly lengthy training programs, often 2–3 h per week for 6–8 weeks. It is unlikely that already over-committed social work practice classes would devote this amount of class time to these strategies. This concurrent mixed methods study examined whether very brief mindfulness training in undergraduate social work practice classes (100 min over the course of a 3.0 semester credit hour course) would influence outcomes on measures of mindfulness, emotional regulation, and empathy, as well as student perceptions of helpfulness in managing stress and meeting course goals. No significant differences were found on quantitative measures at post-test. However, results of the qualitative analysis suggest that even brief mindfulness exercises in social work practice classes are perceived by students as helpful for managing anxiety, staying present-focused with clients, reducing premature judgment, and feeling safe and connected in the classroom. Implications for social work education are discussed.

Keywords:

• Mindfulness
• contemplative pedagogy
• emotional regulation
• empathy
• resilience