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Mindfulness Training and Changes in Teachers' Self-Regulation and Stress: Results From Two Randomized Controlled Trials

Fri, April 8, 2:15 to 3:45pm, Convention Center, Floor: Level Two, Exhibit Hall D Section C

Abstract

This study investigates the relationship between mindfulness training (MT) and public school teachers’ self-reported and behavioral/biomarkers of self-regulation and stress. Mindfulness has been defined as, “paying attention on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally” (Kabat-Zinn, 2003, p. 145). MT appears to cultivate prefrontal lobe, top-down self-regulatory capacities like sustained attention, working memory, mental flexibility and inhibitory control (MLERN, 2012). These self-regulatory skills function to modulate bottom-up, automatic limbic and HPA (hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal) axis functions associated with emotion and stress (McEwen & Davidson, 2014). Mindfulness training has been shown to be effective for helping adults from many backgrounds, facing a variety of stressors, to reduce stress and improve health (Grossman et al., 2004; Harrison, 2014).

In our own work, we have found MT to be effective for reducing teacher stress, and have detailed that mindfulness training leads to new kinds of attitudes towards and (re) appraisals of self and others, new feelings of efficacy in meeting stressful demands, and new forms of coping. These processes all appear to mediate MT effects on teacher stress reduction We seek to extend our previous work on first-person measurements of stress and its constituent social-cognitive and social-emotional features to include third-person, neurophysiological indicators of stress and self-regulation (Roeser et al., 2013; Taylor et al., 2015). Results for the relationship of mindfulness meditation to salivary cortisol and blood pressure have so far been mixed (Carlson, Speca, Faris, & Patel, 2007; Galantino et al, 2005; Roeser et al, 2013), and in our own work, this was partially related to small sample size. This study aims to reexamine these research questions with more study participants.

Combining results from two randomized controlled trials, one in Canada and one in the northwest United States, with the same mindfulness program and instructor, we investigate the following research questions: (1) Does randomization to an 8-week mindfulness training program increase attention and working memory capacity (e.g., self-regulation), and reduce morning levels and volumes of salivary cortisol and afternoon levels of resting blood pressure (e.g., stress) in treatment vs. waitlist-control teachers; and (2) Among teachers in the treatment groups only, does the level of self-reported benefit from the training predict salutary changes in self-regulatory capacity and biomarkers of stress over time?


The study includes results from two field trials in Canada and USA. Both trials utilized a randomized, waitlist-control design. Participation was voluntary; participants were recruited via flyers placed in the mailboxes of public school teachers in each district. Participating teachers completed baseline, post-program and follow-up measures that included a surveys, an interview, and measures of salivary cortisol, blood pressure and executive function. Data from the first RCT in Canada has already shown promising signs for the executive function and diurnal cortisol results (Roeser et al., 2013). We are currently processing data for the second RCT to supplement earlier analyses. It is expected that results of this study will provide support for mindfulness training as an efficacious approach to reducing both self-reported and neurophysiological indicators of stress in teachers, perhaps through enhanced self-regulation.

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