Mindfulness mechanisms in everyday life: examining variance in acceptance, attention monitoring, decentering, self-compassion, and nonreactivity and their links to negative emotions among a workplace sample

ABSTRACT

Theoretical work proposes that acceptance, attention monitoring, decentering, self-compassion, and nonreactivity are mechanisms that explain beneficial effects of mindfulness training. Yet, whether these mechanisms represent independent constructs and whether they naturally vary within person is unclear. This study examined whether mindfulness mechanisms represent independent constructs that naturally fluctuate within a person over time, and whether these fluctuations differentially relate to negative emotions. A sample of university staff employees (n = 143; 74.8% female; M ± SD_age= 38.2 ± 10.9; 53.8% White) reported on mindfulness mechanisms and negative emotions five times a day for four days for a total of 2,122 assessments. Four distinct mechanisms emerged – acceptance-attention, decentering, self-compassion, nonreactivity – that exhibit substantial moment-to-moment variation. Greater acceptance-attention, self-compassion, and nonreactivity were associated with lower negative emotions; greater decentering was associated with higher negative emotions when examined concurrently with the other mechanisms. The unique associations of all mindfulness mechanisms with negative emotions, combined with their high levels of variability from moment to moment, suggest their potential as targets for mindfulness interventions to improve emotional well-being.

KEYWORDS:

• Mindfulness
• mindfulness mechanisms
• negative emotions
• ecological momentary assessment

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was partly supported by a seed grant from the Healthy Campus Network at the University of California, San Francisco (PI: Zawadzki).