Impact of mindfulness and self-compassion on anxiety and depression: The mediating role of resilience

Adrián Pérez-Aranda,Javier García-Campayo,Francisco Gude,Juan V Luciano,Albert Feliu-Soler,Arturo González-Quintela,Yolanda López-Del-Hoyo,Jesus Montero-Marin

doi:10.1016/j.ijchp.2021.100229

Abstract

Background/Objective ‘Third-wave’ psychotherapies have shown effectiveness for treating psychopathological symptoms such as anxiety and depression. There is burgeoning interest in examining how these therapies’ core constructs produce their therapeutic benefits. This study explores the hypothetical mediating effect of resilience in the impact of mindfulness and self-compassion on anxiety and depressive symptoms. Method: Cross-sectional study design. The sample consisted of 860 Spanish general population participants. The measures included the Mindful Attention Awareness Scale (MAAS), the Self-Compassion Scale (SCS-12), the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) and the Goldberg Anxiety and Depression Scale (GADS). Bivariate correlations were calculated, and path analysis models were performed. Results: Significant correlations were found between the study variables, always in the expected direction (all p values <.001). The path analysis models showed significant direct effects of mindfulness and self-compassion on anxiety and depression symptoms, but the only significant indirect effects through resilience were found on depression (MAAS: β = -.05, 95% CI = -.11 to -.02; SCS-12: β = -.06, 95% CI = -.33 to -.07). Conclusions: Resilience might partially mediate the effect of mindfulness and self-compassion on depression, but not on anxiety.

Highlights

Background/Objective ‘Third-wave’ psychotherapies have shown effectiveness for treating psychopathological symptoms such as anxiety and depression
The second hypothesis was not supported by our results in the case of anxiety symptomatology: resilience showed a non-significant effect on anxiety after controlling for mindfulness and self-compassion, which implied that the indirect paths were not statistically significant
Resilience had been identified as a mediator of the effect of mindfulness, it was on other outcomes such as emotion regulation (Wang et al, 2016) and positive affect (Bajaj & Pande, 2016), which can be related to anxiety symptoms, but would probably be more directly associated to depression

Summary

Introduction

Background/Objective ‘Third-wave’ psychotherapies have shown effectiveness for treating psychopathological symptoms such as anxiety and depression. Depression and anxiety are the most common mental disorders in the general population, with a lifetime prevalence of 20.60% in the case of major depressive disorder (Hasin et al, 2018), and a current global prevalence of anxiety disorders of 7.30% (Stein et al, 2017) These conditions, which not seldom are experienced together, often imply a significant loss of quality of life and a certain degree of impairment in different life areas (Khansa et al, 2020). The increasing body of evidence of these interventions’ effectiveness has stimulated analyses on how ‘third-wave’ variables may influence the individual’s mental health In this regard, two possible mediating factors have been studied with growing interest: mindfulness and self-compassion

Methods

Results

Conclusion