Mindfulness in Trainee Psychotherapies with Children and Adolescents

Abstract

Mindfulness in Trainee Psychotherapies with Children and Adolescents The implementation of mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) in cognitive-behavioral therapy has greatly increased over the past few years. However, there is little research about the implementation of MBIs in individual child and adolescent psychotherapy. The present paper gives an overview of current MBIs and their efficacy in children and adolescents. A depiction of the implementation of MBIs in individual therapy and a description of the "Mindfulness and Relaxation Study - Children and Adolescents" (MARS-CA) is given. The study aims to examine the effects of short session-introducing interventions with mindfulness elements on juvenile patients' psychopathological symptomatology and therapeutic alliance. For this reason, the authors compare session-introducing interventions with mindfulness elements with session-introducing relaxation interventions and no session-introducing intervention. Qualitative results of the pre-study show that both interventions with mindfulness elements and relaxation interventions work well with juvenile patients.