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Single vs. Group Mindfulness Meditation: Effects on Personality, Religiousness/Spirituality, and Mindfulness Skills

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Abstract

Multiple lines of evidence show that mindfulness meditation (MM) improves practitioners’ mental health. To date, most studies have tested the effects of mindfulness-based interventions (MBI), which typically combine the practice of mindfulness with in-class psychoeducation and discussions between teacher and practitioners. However, much less is known about the effects of MM practiced in individual settings. The present research investigated the impact of MM in individual (i.e., single) and group settings by testing mindfulness skills, personality profiles, religious/spiritual self-representation, and adherence to the training program, in relation to two groups of healthy adult practitioners. Findings showed that both groups of participants improved in all outcome measures (mindfulness skills, character maturity, and religiousness/spirituality) with no between-group differences, except for a more pronounced effect on the character maturity of those in an individual MM setting, during the 8-week individual and group MM trainings. Moreover, participants to individual and group MM settings meditated at home for a comparable amount of time and dropped out from their training at similar rates. The results suggest that MBI may have potential benefits both when performed in group settings and in individual settings, emphasizing the importance of mindfulness practice for personal growth and healing.

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Acknowledgements

We wish to thank all participants for their time and contribution to the study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Perceptual Robotics (PERCRO) Laboratory, Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna, Pisa, Italy

    Alessio Matiz & Franco Fabbro

  2. Department of Medicine, University of Udine, Udine, Italy

    Franco Fabbro

  3. Department of Languages and Literatures, Communication, Education and Society, University of Udine, Via Margreth 3, 33100, Udine, Italy

    Cristiano Crescentini

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  1. Alessio Matiz
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  2. Franco Fabbro
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  3. Cristiano Crescentini
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Contributions

AM contributed to the study’s conception and design, data collection, analysis and interpretation of data, and writing the manuscript. FF supervised the study and contributed to the manuscript’s revision. CC contributed to the study’s conception and design, data interpretation, and manuscript revision. All authors have read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Cristiano Crescentini.

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Ethical Approval

This study was approved by the Ethics Committee at the University of Udine. All procedures performed in the study were in accordance with the ethical standards of the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Matiz, A., Fabbro, F. & Crescentini, C. Single vs. Group Mindfulness Meditation: Effects on Personality, Religiousness/Spirituality, and Mindfulness Skills. Mindfulness 9, 1236–1244 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12671-017-0865-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12671-017-0865-0

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