You make it work for me: priming social support reduces alienating effects of short mindfulness meditation among poor self-regulators
Niyati Thakur, Nicola Baumann
Motivation and Emotion March 26, 2025 DOI: 10.1007/s11031-025-10112-6 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Experimental study (two studies) Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Sample size | 538 |
| Population | State-oriented (poor self-regulating) individuals |
| Intervention | Mindfulness meditation |
| Duration | 5-minute mindfulness exercise; 5-minute text reading control |
| Measures | Consistency in repeated preference judgements |
| Topics | Meditation |
| Key findings | A 5-minute mindfulness exercise significantly reduced the consistency of repeated preference judgments among poor self-regulators compared with a text-reading control, indicating alienation from the self. Priming social support before mindfulness significantly increased consistency relative to mindfulness alone, buffering the alienating effect. |
Abstract
Mindfulness meditation has become increasingly popular and research shows that it has many positive effects on psychological health. However, recent research indicates that mindfulness meditation may not benefit everybody. Specifically, short mindfulness meditation has been found to alienate poor self-regulators from their self. Our research aimed at replicating the alienating effect of mindfulness meditation among poor self-regulators (replication hypothesis) and expanding previous findings by testing whether adding social support to the mindfulness exercise would buffer the alienating effect (buffer hypothesis). According to the theory of Personality Systems Interactions (PSI), the self is defined as an extended network of implicit representations of own needs, goals, and preferences. We focused on preferences and measured the consistency in repeated preference judgements. Higher consistency indicates reliable access to own preferences, whereas lower consistency indicates alienation from own preferences and the self. In two studies (NStudy1 = 238; NStudy2 = 300), we replicated that mindfulness alienated poor self-regulators (i.e., state-oriented individuals) from their self as indicated by significantly reduced consistency after a 5-minute mindfulness exercise compared to the control condition (5-minute text reading). Consistent with our buffer hypothesis, priming social support before the mindfulness exercise buffered the alienating effect as indicated by significantly increased consistency in the social mindfulness compared to the mindfulness condition. Thus, mindfulness meditation alienated poor self-regulators in its classical form but could be easily adapted to prevent alienation by priming social support. We discuss our findings within the framework of PSI theory.
Comparable studies
Other experimental studies on meditation, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| The benefits of being present: Mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being. Cancer patients (clinical intervention study) | 2003 | Mixed methods: scale development, correlational, quasi-experimental, laboratory, experience-sampling, and clinical intervention study | |
| Loving-kindness meditation increases social connectedness. | 2008 | Controlled laboratory experiment | |
| Mindfulness and mind-wandering: Finding convergence through opposing constructs. | 2012 | Two studies: correlational study and experimental study | |
| Mental Training Enhances Attentional Stability: Neural and Behavioral Evidence | 2009 | Experimental study | |
| Mindfulness meditation and substance use in an incarcerated population. Incarcerated population | 2006 | Quasi-experimental with treatment-as-usual control condition |
Citations in the library
Cites 19
- The benefits of being present: Mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 2003
- Mindfulness training as a clinical intervention: A conceptual and empirical review. Clinical Psychology Science and Practice 2003
- Alterations in Brain and Immune Function Produced by Mindfulness Meditation Psychosomatic Medicine July 1, 2003
- Mind the Hype: A Critical Evaluation and Prescriptive Agenda for Research on Mindfulness and Meditation Perspectives on Psychological Science October 10, 2017
- Exploring self‐compassion and empathy in the context of mindfulness‐based stress reduction (MBSR) Stress and Health March 15, 2010
and 14 more in the library