Journal of Child and Family Studies

, Volume 19, Issue 2, pp 184–189 | Cite as

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) for Primary School Teachers

  • Eluned Gold
  • Alistair Smith
  • Ieuan Hopper
  • David Herne
  • Glenis Tansey
  • Christine Hulland
Original Paper
First Online:

Abstract

Stress within the teaching profession has a negative impact on the health and well-being of individual teachers and on retention and recruitment for the profession as a whole. There is increasing literature to suggest that Mindfulness is a useful intervention to address a variety of psychological problems, and that Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) is a particularly helpful intervention for stress. We investigated the effects of teaching a MBSR course to primary school teachers to reduce stress. The MBSR course was taught to a group of primary school teachers and evaluated to establish its effects on levels of anxiety, depression, and stress, as well as movement towards a stated goal and changes in awareness. The results showed improvement for most participants for anxiety, depression, and stress, some of which were statistically significant. There were also significant improvements on two of the four dimensions of a mindfulness skills inventory. These results suggest that this approach could be a potentially cost-effective method to combat teacher stress and burnout.

Keywords

Mindfulness Stress management Teacher burn-out Emotional literacy Meditation 
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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2009

Authors and Affiliations

  • Eluned Gold
    • 1
  • Alistair Smith
    • 2
  • Ieuan Hopper
    • 2
  • David Herne
    • 3
  • Glenis Tansey
    • 3
  • Christine Hulland
    • 4
  1. 1.Centre for Mindfulness Research and Practice, School of PsychologyBangor UniversityBangorWales, UK
  2. 2.Lancashire Care Foundation NHS TrustPrestonUK
  3. 3.Central Lancashire Primary Care NHS TrustLeylandUK
  4. 4.Lancashire County CouncilPrestonUK

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