Self-Control Strength and Mindfulness in Physical Exercise Performance: Does a Short Mindfulness Induction Compensate for the Detrimental Ego Depletion Effect?

Abstract

To meet specific goals, athletes frequently have to deal with several demands that may deplete their limited self-control resources, which may in turn negatively affect their subsequent performance in a wide variety of sports-related tasks (e.g., coordinative, psychological, and physical tasks). Mindfulness meditation may be beneficial for mechanisms involved during self-control exertion, because it supports efficient emotion regulation, attention regulation, and executive functioning. In our study, we investigated the effects of a short mindfulness exercise on physical performance in a state with temporarily depleted self-control strength (ego depletion). We applied a mixed between- (ego depletion: yes vs. no) and within- (two times of measurement, 7 days apart; mindfulness: yes vs. no; order counterbalanced) subjects design to test our hypothesis in a sample of 34 sport students. Ego depletion was manipulated via a well-established transcription task. For the manipulation of mindfulness, participants performed a 4-min mindfulness exercise via audio in the mindfulness condition and listened to an audiobook in the control condition. As a dependent variable, participants performed a previously validated strenuous physical exercise (plank exercise) for as long as possible, and we measured the relative difference between the baseline measurement and the second trial. We found no interaction effect, meaning that a short mindfulness exercise was not able to compensate for the detrimental ego depletion effect. In future studies, potential mechanisms should be assessed to reveal the ego depletion effect on physical exercise performance.

Lay summary: In our study, we investigated the effects of a short mindfulness meditation exercise on physical performance (isometric plank exercise) in a state with temporarily depleted self-control strength (ego depletion). This short mindfulness exercise (breathing meditation) was not able to compensate for the detrimental ego depletion effect on physical exercise performance.

FOOTNOTES

Notes

1 The Stroop task (Stroop, 1935) asks participants to work on a series of color words, which may be displayed either in a color matching its semantic meaning (i.e., congruent trial; e.g., “blue” written in blue font color) or in a color that does not match its semantic meaning (i.e., incongruent trial; “blue” written in red font color). The participants are asked to ignore the semantic meaning of the respective word and to name the font color instead, which in the case of the incongruent trials requires self-control strength (e.g., Wallace & Baumeister, 2002).

2 Participants completed the German version of the Comprehensive Inventory of Mindfulness Experiences (Bergomi, Tschacher, & Kupper, 2014) to assess trait-mindfulness. To assess trait self-control strength, the German short version of the Self-Control Scale (Bertrams & Dickhäuser, 2009) was completed.

3 When trait mindfulness (CHIME) and trait self-control strength (SCS-K-D) were not included as covariates, there was still no significant interaction, F(1, 32) = 0.52, p = .48, η² = .02; no significant main effect for the within-factor mindfulness, F(1, 32) = 1.08, p = .31, η² = .03; and no significant main effect for the between-factor ego depletion, F(1, 32) = 0.17, p = .68, η² = .01.