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Religious and Existential Determinants of Affective Response to a Brief Mindfulness Intervention

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Abstract

Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) are often promoted in the Western world as being “secular” in nature, despite the religious/spiritual (R/S) roots of mindfulness itself. Relevant individual characteristics such as R/S, however, have yet to be examined thoroughly in relation to treatment response. Using pre-post experimental designs, we examined the interaction of participant religiosity and different religious framings (Buddhist, secular, spiritual) of a brief MBI as determinants of affective responses to the MBI using regression in two online samples (Study 1: N=677; Study 2: N= 157). Aspects of religiosity (existential quest, scriptural literalism) had differential effects on affective responses to MBIs dependent on the framing of the condition. Participants’ R/S, as well as the R/S attributes of an MBI, may impact affective responses to MBIs. Further research is needed to ascertain how, and to what extent, MBIs might be optimized in order to maximize benefits for participants with diverse religious and existential commitments.

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Acknowledgement

The authors would like to acknowledge those who provided advisement and feedback on the scripts for each of the brief interventions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Warren Alpert Medical School at Brown University, Providence, RI, USA

    Micheline R. Anderson, Deanna M. Kaplan & Roman Palitsky

  2. Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA

    Deanna M. Kaplan

Authors
  1. Micheline R. Anderson
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  2. Deanna M. Kaplan
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  3. Roman Palitsky
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation and data collection were performed by Roman Palitsky and Deanna Kaplan and analyses were performed by Roman Palitsky. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Micheline R. Anderson, Roman Palitsky, & Deanna Kaplan, and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Micheline R. Anderson.

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Funding

Data collection was supported in part by a contribution from Drs. Fran and Tim Orrok. The preparation of this manuscript was additionally supported by the National Institutes of Health through grant 1F32HL154751 (Kaplan).

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no competing interests.

Data Availability

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available via request from the senior author (Palitsky). Data may be made available via repository at editors’ request. Study data are available on Figshare repository: https://figshare.com/s/36f1a4485806fc061267. Individuals interested in these data are encouraged to contact the coresponding author.

Ethical Approval

This study was performed in line with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki. Approval was granted by the Institutional Review Board of the University of Arizona.

Informed Consent

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

Additional information

Handling Editor: Judith Moskowitz

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Anderson, M.R., Kaplan, D.M. & Palitsky, R. Religious and Existential Determinants of Affective Response to a Brief Mindfulness Intervention. Affec Sci 4, 143–151 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42761-022-00139-0

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