Benefits of Mindfulness for Nursing Students
General Benefits of Mindfulness
Mindfulness Is...
-
A wide range of practices and processes centered on the capacity for attention, awareness, memory, retention, and acceptance or discernment
-
An intentional practice of awareness that develops from nonjudgmentally focusing on the present moment including thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations, to help foster wisdom, insight, and compassion
Mindfulness Can....
-
Manage and prevent psychological strain associated with stress, burnout, and symptoms of traumatic stress
-
Decrease perception of stressful demands
-
Maintain focus on the present moment
-
Minimize attention to peripheral thoughts
-
Reduce suffering
-
Decrease anxiety, and depression
-
Reduce the tendency to ruminate
-
Decrease cortisol production (reduce stress reactivity)
-
Improve mindfulness and self-compassion
-
Encourage neuroplasticity
-
Stimulate the prefrontal cortex (area of the brain known to help control attention, motor control, motivation, and cognitive control
-
Help individuals gain a greater sense of control through increased awareness
-
Foster a sustainable and healthy mindset
-
Enhance attentional control
-
Increase academic achievements, empathy, and quality of life
Self-Regulation
-
Self-regulation is the ability to control behaviors, thoughts, emotions, and impulses. It is the process by which a system maintains stability of function and adaptability to new circumstances.
-
Self-regulation plays a central role in navigating academic and clinical stress for nursing students.
Role of Mindfulness
-
Mindfulness influences three aspects of self-regulation
-
attention control
-
self-awareness
-
emotional regulation
-
-
Self-awareness through mindfulness enables nursing students to identify and proactively manage stressors or demanding situations through self-regulation
-
Focusing on breath can enhance emotional regulation and the mind-body connection
-
Cognitive-behavioral therapy interventions based on mindful-compassion have been shown to promote emotional regulation and psychological flexibility, as well as foster relational and ethical skills.
Benefits for Nursing Students
-
Self-regulation improves:
-
Executive functioning
-
Reduced perception of stress
-
Anxiety
-
-
Nursing students who participated in mindful meditation reported feeling more focused, relaxed, centered, and aware
-
Enhancements in attentional focus can positively impact
-
Academic performance
-
cognitive, socio-emotional, and attentional development
-
-
When higher levels of mindfulness are present to regulate emotions, more resources are available for nursing students to cope with stress, anxiety, depression, fatigue, and negative mood states caused by their education
Self-Compassion
-
Compassion is defined as recognizing the suffering in others, feeling kindness toward those suffering, desiring to help, and acknowledging our shared human condition.
-
Self-compassion involves the same qualities but instead points inward, acknowledging and responding warmly to one’s own suffering, often stemming from self-judgment and self-criticism
-
Self-compassion combines three core components:
-
self-kindness
-
common humanity
-
mindfulness
-
Role of Mindfulness
-
Research indicates that practicing mindfulness and acceptance fosters compassion, allowing nursing students to deepen their engagement and understanding of suffering and to take skillful actions to alleviate it
-
Increasing self-compassion through mindfulness is an effective way to promote emotional well-being by cultivating a positive mental state
-
Nursing students can foster caring through the development of mindfulness, which in turn, empowers patients to make positive changes in their health
Benefits for Nursing Students
-
The benefits of self-compassion include improved:
-
Emotional resilience
-
Well-being
-
Contentment
-
Intelligence
-
-
Practicing self-compassion is backed by consistent findings in research and literature to decrease feelings of anxiety and depression
-
Fostering compassion and empathy toward oneself and others is one foundational practice that nursing students can develop to provide well-rounded and culturally competent care.
Emotional Intelligence
-
Emotional intelligence is the ability to
-
recognize emotions in oneself and others
-
communicate feelings effectively
-
understand emotions and their meanings through relationships
-
regulate and manage emotions
-
-
High emotional intelligence is more beneficial than effective coping styles, job factors, demographics, or trauma load
Role of Mindfulness
-
Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) showed that electrical activity in specific brain regions involved in expressing emotions shifted in participants, suggesting that meditators were handling emotions more effectively
-
Introducing emotional intelligence interventions into nursing curricula increased nursing students’ emotional coping resources and social skills, suggesting that this may benefit their long-term occupational health
Benefits for Nursing Students
-
Emotional intelligence is a critical internal resource for nursing students to develop as it can:
-
increase emotional coping
-
reduce symptoms of traumatic stress
-
and facilitate post-traumatic growth
-
-
Emotional intelligence can enhance empathy, self-regulation in conflict situations, and the ability to effectively respond to others’ feelings, which is critical in student clinical settings and when communicating with patients
Resilience
-
Resilience reflects an individual’s ability to:
-
adapt and thrive in the face of adversity
-
enhance self-efficacy, persistence, and the ability to learn from challenging situations
-
-
Resilience is a crucial factor in enhancing the ability to cope with clinical stress and responding to workplace adversity
Role of Mindfulness
-
The practice of acceptance and attention through mindfulness is linked to greater resilience in nursing students.
-
Mindfulness and resilience are also associated with improved
-
well-being
-
performance
-
lower dropout rates among students during their education and careers
-
Benefits for Nursing Students
-
Resilience can lead to positive psychological outcomes including:
-
Reduced anxiety
-
Lower incidence of traumatic disorders
-
-
Resilience can help nursing students maintain their holistic health, well-being, and ability to cope with stress during their academic and clinical experiences
“In nurse training, there is a recognition that resilience in the learning milieu in both academic and clinical environments is essential for student well-being” (Mitchell, 2021).
Potential Adverse Effects (AEs)
Please read if you are a trauma survivor or have a history of pre-existing mental health conditions
Mindfulness interventions may not be suitable for all students, particularly trauma survivors. For these participants, practicing mindfulness meditation can pose dangers and may exacerbate distress if participants lack proper guidance or support. Commonly reported adverse events (AEs) of meditation include “increased stress, anxiety, depression, intensity of emotions and fluctuations in mood, depersonalization, derealization, the resurfacing of repressed childhood trauma, and psychosis.”
Due to the possibility of AEs from meditation, screening tools will be available prior to each meditation to assess participant readiness. For those with elevated scores, please proceed with caution or seek additional support from a mental health professional if needed.
Reminder: There is no shame in being a trauma survivor or having a history of mental health conditions. However, it is important to approach these interventions safely and with approrpiate support to provide the best possible outcomes.