Which are the best questionnaires to longitudinally evaluate mindfulness skills in personality disorders?

Does trait mindfulness mediate the relationship between borderline personality symptoms and emotion dysregulation?

BACKGROUND

Emotion dysregulation is core to many biopsychosocial models of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and is often targeted as part of their associated psychological therapies. Several distinct specialist psychotherapies are thought to be effective for people diagnosed with BPD but it is unclear whether they share common change mechanisms. Some evidence suggests that Mindfulness Based Interventions improve competency in emotion regulation as well as trait mindfulness, which are both plausibly associated with good treatment outcomes. It is unclear whether the association between the severity of BPD symptoms and emotion dysregulation is mediated by trait mindfulness. Would improvement in trait mindfulness mediate an association between lower severity of BPD symptoms and fewer problems of emotion dysregulation?

METHODS

One thousand and twelve participants completed online, single time-point, self-report questionnaires.

RESULTS

As predicted, the severity of BPD symptoms was significantly and positively associated with emotion dysregulation with a large effect size (r = .77). Trait mindfulness mediated this relationship as the 95% confidence interval for the indirect effect did not cross zero (size of direct effect = .48 and size of indirect effect = .29 [.25, .33].

CONCLUSIONS

The relationship between the severity of BPD symptoms and emotion dysregulation was confirmed in this dataset. As hypothesised, this relationship was mediated by trait mindfulness. Process measures of emotion dysregulation and mindfulness should be included in intervention studies for people diagnosed with BPD to understand if improvements in these factors are a universal occurrence with good response to treatment. Other process measures should also be explored to identify other factors involved in the relationship between BPD symptoms and emotion dysregulation.

A Network Investigation of Core Mindfulness Processes

Objective

Mindfulness has been associated with improved psychological well-being and health, although outcomes from mindfulness-based interventions are mixed. One challenge is a limited understanding about which specific processes are core to mindfulness. Network analysis offers a method to characterize the core processes of mindfulness.

Methods

This study used network analysis to identify which processes are central to mindfulness (have the strongest connectivity with other mindfulness processes) as measured by the Five Facets Mindfulness Questionnaire- Short Form, analyzed at the item-level. Data were obtained from baseline of a randomized clinical trial of smartphone app-based mindfulness training for smoking cessation.

Results

The most central processes in the mindfulness network included, "I think some of my emotions are bad or inappropriate and I shouldn't feel them," an aspect of Nonjudgment/acceptance; as well as "I can easily put my beliefs, opinions, and expectations into words," and "It's hard for me to find the words to describe what I'm thinking," aspects of Describing.

Conclusions

Findings help to clarify which processes are to mindfulness, contributing to a better understanding of the definition of mindfulness, and suggest factors that may be promising to target in mindfulness-based interventions. Future research should examine if mindfulness-based interventions may be improved by targeting these core mindfulness processes.

The correlation between mindfulness and negative automatic thoughts in depression patients

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study is to determine the correlation between mindfulness and negative automatic thoughts in depression patients.

DESIGN AND METHODS

The sample of the study, which was conducted as a correlational descriptive study, was determined as 151 patients with depression via power analysis. The Descriptive Characteristics Form, "Mindful Attention Awareness Scale (MAAS)," and "Automatic Thoughts Questionnaire-Negative (ATQ-N)" were used to collect the data.

FINDINGS

It was determined that the total mean score of the participants was 32.59 ± 8.55 in the MAAS and 109.06 ± 15.07 in the ATQ-N. In the study, it was found that there was a statistically negative strong correlation between mindfulness and negative automatic thoughts of patients with depression (p < 0.05).

PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS

In the study, it was determined that the patients had higher negative automatic thoughts and lower mindfulness. Also, mindfulness accounted for negative automatic thoughts at the rate of 56%.