Effectiveness of brief mindfulness training for athletes' mood: The moderating effect of burnout.

Brief mindfulness training improved athletes' mindfulness and reduced negative mood and burnout. In a randomized experiment, 60 athletes were assigned to either a mindfulness training group or a control group. After training, the mindfulness group showed significantly higher mindfulness scores and significantly lower burnout and mood disturbance scores compared to the control group. A moderation analysis indicated that the effect of mindfulness training on mood depended on athletes' initial burnout level, suggesting that athletes with higher burnout may benefit more from the intervention.

Study at a glance

Abstract

To explore the impact of brief mindfulness training on athletes' mood and the moderating effect of burnout between them. This study has employed the mixed experimental design of 2 (experimental conditions) × 2 (time points), randomly assigned 60 athletes into a mindfulness training group and a control group (30 athletes in each group), and selected the Five Facets Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ), Profile of Mood States (POMS), and Athlete Burnout Questionnaire (ABQ) to conduct separate tests before and after mindfulness training. The recruitment period began on March 6, 2024 and ended on April 6, 2024. The results show that: (1) in the pretest, the differences between the mindfulness training group and the control group in the levels of mindfulness, mood, and burnout are not statistically significant; (2) in the posttest, compared with those of the control group, the FFMQ score (p < 0.001) of the mindfulness training group improves significantly, while both the ABQ score (p = 0.040) and the POMS score (p = 0.003) of the mindfulness training group decline significantly; and (3) the Bootstrap analysis of the moderating effect shows that the regression model is significant (R2 = 0.355, ΔR2 = 0.079, F = 6.10, p = 0.017), and the regression coefficient of group×ABQ pretest is statistically significant. The results of this study reveal the effectiveness of brief mindfulness training on athletes' mood and which types of athletes can benefit more from mindfulness training, which provide an empirical basis for intervening on mood.