Effectiveness of mindfulness-based coloring for university students’ test anxiety

Abstract

Objective: This study compared the effectiveness of mindfulness coloring (mandala), free drawing/coloring, and a noncoloring control activity for university students’ test anxiety, and assessed the relationship of dispositional mindfulness and response to intervention on mindfulness and test anxiety states. Participants: University students (n = 167; 81.4% female; M_age = 21.29 years, SD = 4.46) were randomly assigned to a mandala (n = 57), free draw/coloring (n = 58), or noncoloring condition (n = 52). Methods: Participants completed standardized measures assessing test anxiety and state mindfulness pre–postactivity before completing a test, and two dispositional mindfulness measures. Results: Participants in both coloring conditions reported significant decreases in test anxiety and significant increases in state mindfulness pre–postintervention, and participants in the control condition reported significant increases in test anxiety. Reports of preintervention state mindfulness and test anxiety fully mediated relations between dispositional mindfulness and postintervention state mindfulness and test anxiety. Conclusions: Implications for research and practice on mindfulness coloring and test anxiety are discussed.

Keywords:

• Art making
• mandala
• mindfulness
• test anxiety
• university

Conflict of interest disclosure

The authors have no conflicts of interest to report. The authors confirm that the research presented in this article met the ethical guidelines, including adherence to the legal requirements, of Canada and received approval from the Institutional Review Board of McGill University.

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.