Mindful Coping and Mental Health among Adolescents

Abstract

The aim of the research described here is to provide knowledge of adolescents and their coping strategies through the construct of mindful coping. Little is known about the contributions of mindfulness to the enhancement of mental health in adolescents. Inspired by dialectical behaviour therapy (Linehan, 1993a, b), we discuss the mindful coping process and investigate how different aspects of this process are related to mental health in a non-clinical adolescent sample. The empirical approach consisted of a cross-sectional study of 652 high-school students from two high schools, covering all streams. The relations between the four proposed mindful coping aspectsawareness, distraction, preventing negative emotions and constructive self-assertionwith psychological symptoms (PS), as well as how these four aspects moderated the relationship of perceived life strains (LS) with PS, were studied. The results show that coping by preventing negative emotions and constructive self-assertion were associated with fewer PS and/or weaker association between LS and PS, whereas coping by use of distraction was related to more PS and did not moderate the association between LS and PS. Finally, coping by use of awareness was related to a stronger association of LS with PS. The results only partly supported our expectations, providing challenging and important knowledge for future research on mindful coping in adolescents.