How mindfulness meditation can be used to manage student stress.

1. CALM,CENTERED,ANDCONFIDENT:
MINDFULNESSMEDITATIONASATOOL
FORMANAGINGSTUDENTSTRESS
BOB FULLER, PHD, PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGIOUS STUDIES,
BRADLEY UNIVERSITY
MARK LEHTMAN, BS, PSYCHOLOGY AND HISTORY, BRADLEY UNIVERSITY
Calm Confident
Centered
MINDFULNESS MEDITATION
A Tool for Managing Student Stress

2. Mindfulness is defined as being
focused in the moment. 1,2
One way to practice mindfulness
meditation consists of simply
sitting in a comfortable position
for ten to twelve minutes while
concentrating on the sensation
of air moving in and out of the
lungs. For these few minutes one
is instructed to notice—then let
go of—every distracting thought
that comes into the mind. The
goal of mindfulness meditation
is to be as attentive as possible
to the simple act of breathing in
order to live fully in the moment,
free from distracting thoughts
or emotions. The purpose
of mindfulness meditation is
thus to be fully conscious of
each moment of experience
with minimal interference from
competing mental states, such
as regret, worry, anticipation,
or other emotion-driven
distractions.
The recent popularity of
mindfulness meditation
in corporations and other
enterprises across America
attests to a growing and broad-
based interest in finding ways
to negotiate the demands of a
multitasking culture. Hundreds
of research articles suggest
that mindfulness exercises can
help people overcome anxiety,
concentrate better, and even
become more compassionate. 3,4,5
To build upon this past research,
an experiment was designed
to determine (1) if mindfulness
meditation techniques can be
taught effectively in a university
setting, and (2) if they provide
benefits for students.
METHODS
The experiment was conducted
with 28 college students
who attended a one-credit
mindfulness seminar that met
one hour a week for eight
weeks. Prior to the seminar’s first
meeting, participants filled out a
questionnaire with items from the
Rosenberg Self-Esteem Survey, 6
the Perceived Stress Survey,7
the
Self-Compassion Survey,8
and
the Altruistic Inventory.9
The students met once a week
for instruction and practice using
a set of thirty-minute videos that
cover the basics of mindfulness
practice. Along with these weekly
meetings, participants were
asked to practice mindfulness
meditation on their own for at
least ten minutes, four times per
week throughout the eight-week
seminar.
Students kept informal logs
to record the date and setting
of these required meditation
sessions. The final assignment
was to write a reflection paper
assessing their experience with
mindfulness meditation.
FINDINGS
After the experimental period of
eight weeks was over, the initial
questionnaire was administered
again (see Table 1). Participants’
self-reported scores increased
on three of the four initial
measures: stress, self-esteem,
and compassion. This increase
indicates that individual levels of
perceived stress decreased over
the eight-week instruction period,
while levels of self-esteem and
compassion towards themselves
increased during this period.
Ten minutes of calmly watching
one’s own breath sounds easy.
Yet the experiment’s participants
found this simple task to be
incredibly difficult at first. Their
minds often raced toward
other thoughts such as creating
checklists for accomplishing
tasks, worrying about the
outcome of some project or
test, and fretting over strained
personal relationships. Each
week, however, they improved
at shedding such distracting
thoughts and “returning to their
breath.” Within weeks they had
gained a new technique to add
INTRODUCTION
2

3. to their repertoire of life skills.
As many reported, mindfulness
meditation taught them to take
a break from scheming, fretting,
and striving. For ten minutes they
could “just live.”
ALMOST ALL OF THE
PARTICIPANTS PRAISED
MINDFULNESS PRACTICES
AS A TECHNIQUE THAT
HELPED THEM DEFUSE
ANXIETY BEFORE GIVING
A PRESENTATION,
TAKING A TEST, OR
INITIATING A POTENTIALLY
CONFRONTATIONAL
CONVERSATION.
One student sent an email
right after giving an important
oral presentation for his senior
engineering project. He wrote
that about fifteen minutes
before his speech he had been
so nervous that he was visibly
shaking. He found an empty
room nearby and decided he
had no other option than to try
out his newly acquired ability for
practicing mindfulness. A little
more than ten minutes later he
stood up and walked into his
presentation, calm and confident.
Another student wrote, “I found
myself using meditation to try
and reset my mind and rid myself
of anxiety.” Another participant
noted, “After meditating, I felt
like a weight had been lifted from
my shoulders and that everything
was going to be fine.” Many
students mentioned increased
self-esteem and increased self-
control as being a product of
their mindfulness practice. As one
put it, “I am more aware of what
I am feeling and can take control
of those emotions in whatever
situation I am involved in.”
The Self-Compassion scale used
in this experiment contains a
number of subscales which, when
analyzed individually, increased
in a pattern similar to the other
scales over the eight – week
period. These subscales indicated
that participants strengthened
such personality traits as self-
kindness, self-judgment, sharing
a common humanity with another
person, a general sense of
mindfulness, feelings of isolation
and reflection, as well as an
increased sense of identification
with the world around them (see
Table Two).
Increased “feelings of isolation”
may at first seem unexpected,
but these feelings make sense
in the context of repeated
experiences of sitting alone
and reflecting. This particular
subscale might be an example
of how mindfulness meditation
fosters a sense of centeredness,
creating an appropriate balance
between internal locus of control
and enhanced awareness of the
surrounding world.
The only item that did not
“improve” (i.e., change in the
predicted direction) was the
participants’ collective score on
the Altruistic Inventory scale. This
result is somewhat odd given
that participants did increase
in such measures as sharing a
common humanity with another
person and an increased sense
of identification with the world
around them. It is possible,
though, that a personality trait
such as altruism is too complex
to manipulate and measure
accurately during a time interval
as short as eight weeks. This
unexpected finding, however,
certainly does warrant further
investigation.
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4. Condition Percent Change
Self-Esteem Increased by 1.5%
Perceived Stress Decreased by 7.4%
Self-Compassion Increased by 7.7%
Altruism Decreased by 1.5%
Condition Percent Change
Self-Kindness Increased by 3.9%
Self-Judgment Increased by 8.7%
Humanity Increased by 12%
Isolation Increased by 5.8%
Mindfulness Increased by 8.4%
Over-Identification Increased by 7.4%
TABLE 1: Changes in Personality Trait Scores after
Mindfulness Instruction
TABLE 2: Changes in Compassion Sub-Scale Scores
after Mindfulness Instruction
LIMITATIONS
OF THE STUDY
It was clear from the outset that the
environmental complexities of college
life would make it difficult to produce
dramatic changes in the relatively stable
personality traits being measured. After
all, most aspects of these students’
lives lay outside of the experiment’s
control over the course of this study.
Furthermore, students filled out the
initial questionnaire after several weeks
of vacation and before the academic
semester had fully begun. When students
completed the final questionnaire eight
weeks later, the pressures of academic
life had presumably increased.
Given the relatively small size of our
sample, we decided to supplement our
quantitative measures of change with
two additional items designed to give
us some qualitative data concerning
the possible effects of mindfulness
meditation. Participants turned in a log
noting the date, time, and location of
their meditation periods over the eight
weeks of the seminar. They
also wrote a four-page paper in
which they were asked to reflect
candidly on whether they saw
any value in these practices
going forward in their lives. No
participants wrote that they
were now confirmed meditators
or saw themselves wanting to
practice mindfulness on a daily
basis. The majority, however,
stated that they now possessed
a valuable tool to put in their
“personal toolbox” for dealing
with life’s stresses and strains.
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5. A quiet location
Meditation is usually
practiced in a quiet place
with as few distractions
as possible. A specific,
comfortable posture
Meditationcanbe
donewhilesitting,lyingdown,
standing,walking,or
inotherpositions.
An open attitude
This means letting distractions
come and go naturally
without judging them.
A focus of attention
Themeditatormayfocusona
mantra(aspeciallychosenwordor
setofwords),anobject,orthe
sensationsofthe
breath.
IMPLICATIONS
FOR COLLEGES
UNIVERSITIES
As mentioned above, participants
doubted that they would ever
become daily meditators.
Virtually all reported that they
found meditating difficult
and many reported that they
often wondered if those extra
ten minutes would be better
spent napping. But almost
all mentioned that this brief
exposure to mindfulness
techniques gave them valuable
new tools for their “personal tool
box.” They found it reassuring to
know they have some additional
skills for becoming calm,
centered, and confident amidst
the frantic moments of everyday
life.
These helpful “life tools”
can easily be taught in a
university setting. Instructional
videos are widely available.
Organizing groups to learn
mindfulness doesn’t require
a trained professional—only
someone willing to become
a co-learner. Mindfulness can
be practiced anywhere—in a
dorm room or even at a desk
in the library. It only takes a few
minutes. Universities could even
encourage this step toward
wellness by buying a set of
instructional videos and making
them available to be watched
alone or in groups.
Just providing students with an
action plan for those moments
when they feel besieged by
fear or worry might itself be an
important step toward helping
them become calm, centered,
and confident in both their
personal and professional lives.
In addition, new research shows
that mindfulness training can
assist in other areas besides
stress and emotion regulation.
Some studies have found
that that these techniques are
beneficial for those dealing with
addiction and other substance
abuse issues. 10,11,12
Mindfulness
practices seem, for example,
to be an effective supplement
to other alcohol treatment
programs.
CONCLUSION
Overall, this experiment with
28 students and an eight-week
seminar offers some evidence
that mindfulness meditation can
provide college students with an
effective tool for managing stress.
Programs to teach these skills can
be implemented inexpensively
and without trained professionals,
though it might be easy to
identify skilled practitioners
among a university’s faculty and
professional staff.
Even if most students would not
practice mindfulness on a regular
basis, our study suggests that
such instruction would still help
give them tools for defusing the
tensions that arise in the hectic
environment of a college or
university.
ELEMENTS OF MINDFULNESS
MEDITATION13
Mindfulness meditation instructs the practitioner to
become mindful of thoughts, feelings, and
sensations and to observe them in a non
judgmental way. This practice is believed to result
in a state of greater calmness and physical relaxation,
and psychological balance. Practicing mindfulness
meditation can change how a person relates to the flow
of emotions and thoughts.
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6. REFERENCES
1
Nhat Hanh, T. (1976). The Miracle of Mindfulness!: A Manual of Meditation. Boston: Beacon Press.
2
Kabat-Zin, J. (1991). Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of the Body and Mind to Face
Stress, Pain, and Illness. New York: Dell.
3
Troyer, J., Tost, J., Yoshimura, M., LaFontaine, S., Mabie, A. (2012). Teaching Students How to
Meditate Can Improve Level of Consciousness and Problem Solving Ability. Procedia - Social and
Behavioral Sciences, 69, 153-161.
4
Desrosiers, A., Vine, V., Klemanski, D., Nolen-Hoeskema, S. (2013). Mindfulness and Emotion
Regulation in Depression and Anxiety: Common and Distinct Mechanisms of Action. Depression
and Anxiety, 30(7), 654-661.
5
Menezes, C., de Paula Couto, M., et al. (2013). The Improvement of Emotion and Attention
Regulation After a 6-week Training of Focused Meditation: A Randomized Controlled Trial.
Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine, 1-11.
6
Rosenberg, M. (1965). Society and the Adolescent Self-Image. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press.
7
Cohen, S., Kamarck, T., Mermelstein, R. (1983). A Global Measure of Perceived Stress. Journal of
Health and Social Behavior, 24(4), 385-396.
8
Neff, K. (2003). Development and Validation of a Scale to Measure Self-Compassion. Self and
Identity, 2, 223-250.
9
Rushton, J., Chrisjohn, R., Fekken, G. (1981). The Altruistic Personality and the Self-Report
Altruism Scale. Personality and Individual Differences, 2, 293-302.
10
Hau, S., Grow, J., Marlatt, G. (2008). Mindfulness and Addiction. In Galanter, M. (Ed.), Recent
Developments in Alcoholism (pp. 229-250). New York: Springer.
11
Witkiewitz, K., Marlatt, G., Walker, D. (2005). Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention for Alcohol
and Substance Abuse Disorders. Journal of Cognitive Psychotherapy, 19(3), 211-228.
12
Vallejo, Z., Horensia, A. (2009). Adaptation of Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Program for
Addiction Relapse Prevention. The Humanistic Psychologist, 37, 192-206.
13
NIH National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. (2010). Meditation: An
Introduction. Retrieved from http://nccam.nih.gov/sites/nccam.nih.gov/files/meditation.pdf
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7. MEET THE AUTHORS
Bob Fuller, PhD
Bob Fuller is Caterpillar Inc. Professor of Religious Studies
at Bradley University. Bob is the author of 13 books on
the psychology of religion and American religious history,
including his most recent book The Body of Faith: A
Biological History of Religion in America (University of
Chicago Press, 2013). Other research interests include
the role of emotions in religion and the history of
unconventional American religion.
Mark Lehtman, BS
Mark recently received his Bachelor of Science degree in
psychology and history from Bradley University in Peoria,
Illinois. While an undergraduate, he researched a variety
of topics in the areas of narcissism, approach/avoidance
motivation, and mindfulness meditation. Currently, Mark
lives in Buffalo Grove, Illinois, where he works as the
Assistant Director for Glencoe Youth Services and Glencoe
Junior High Project. These organizations work to provide
wholesome community service and social activities for the
youth of North Shore Chicago. He will soon pursue a PhD
in social/personality psychology.
Bradley University is a private, independent university
located in Peoria, Illinois. Bradley’s residential campus is
home to approximately 4,500 undergraduate students
and 500 graduate students studying liberal and fine arts,
the sciences, engineering, education, business, and the
health sciences. Bradley is known for its commitment
to excellence in classroom teaching and for launching
students into successful professional careers.
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