PurposeBrief mindfulness-based interventions have received great research attention, including in the domain of anxiety. However, quantitative studies do not provide in-depth accounts of how brief mindfulness is experienced. In this qualitative study, we explored how non-meditator undergraduate students learn brief mindfulness and apply it to anxiety-provoking aspects of COVID-19. MethodsWe...
This study examined the association of food-specific decentering experiences with food cravings in a sample of meditators. Decentering refers to viewing one's thoughts as transient mental events and thus experiencing them as less subjectively real. This process has been suggested to be a key mechanism underlying the effects of mindfulness and many contemplative practices. Although most earlier...
Ruminative thoughts about a stressful event can seem subjectively real, as if the imagined event were happening in the moment. One possibility is that this subjective realism results from simulating the self as engaged in the stressful event (immersion). If so, then the process of decentering--disengaging the self from the event--should reduce the subjective realism associated with immersion,...
Decentering is a key component of mindfulness, conceptualised as a metacognitive insight into the transience of one’s mental experiences (Safran & Segal, 1990). In this preregistered mixed-methods experiment, we examined the effectiveness of a brief decentering-based mindfulness strategy in curbing anxiety related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants (N = 316; non-meditators) were instructed...