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Heart of Joy: a Randomized Controlled Trail Evaluating the Effect of an Appreciative Joy Meditation Training on Subjective Well-Being and Attitudes

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Abstract

Many studies support the beneficial effects of the “four immeasurable meditations” (FIM) that originate from Buddhism, but most psychological interventions adopt FIM that cultivate loving-kindness and compassion. The current study developed and evaluated a 4-week training program named “Heart of Joy” (HOJ) that is based on FIM that cultivate appreciative joy. Participants were randomly assigned to HOJ training (n = 59) or a wait-list condition (n = 42), and the final sample consisted of 41 participants in each condition. Satisfaction with life, appreciative joy, envy, emotions, and attitudes toward oneself and others were measured at pre-training, at post-training, and at a 1-month follow-up. The time × condition (M)ANOVA showed that HOJ participants had significantly higher low-arousal positive emotions and lower high-arousal and low-arousal negative emotions at both the post-training and follow-up assessments, as well as higher medium-arousal positive emotions at the post-training assessment only. HOJ participants also reported significantly higher life satisfaction at both the post-training and follow-up assessments and significantly lower envy at the follow-up assessment. The results had a medium effect size (Cohen’s d values ranging from 0.52 to 0.69). Appreciative joy, all attitudes, high-arousal positive emotions, and medium-arousal negative emotions did not show significant results. Further investigations revealed that changes in appreciative joy were more closely associated with changes in high-arousal than low-arousal positive emotions, and changes in envy were more closely associated with changes in attitudes toward oneself than attitudes toward others; this outcome indicates that appreciative joy and envy were impacted during this intervention. This study suggests that HOJ is a promising training program to improve subjective well-being and envy, and the implications for research were discussed.

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Acknowledgements

The training program “Heart of Joy” was designed by Xianglong Zeng without financial support from any institution, and the details of training program are available by request from xzeng@bnu.edu.cn. Dr. Oei is now an Emeritus Professor of University of Queensland.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Beijing Key Laboratory of Applied Experimental Psychology, National Demonstration Center for Experimental Psychology Education (Beijing Normal University), Faculty of Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China

    Xianglong Zeng

  2. College of Management, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, People’s Republic of China

    Rong Wang

  3. Beijing Key Laboratory of Applied Experimental Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, People’s Republic of China

    Rong Wang

  4. School of Psychology, University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia

    Tian P. S. Oei

  5. Department of Psychology, James Cook University Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    Tian P. S. Oei

  6. Department of Psychology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, HKSAR, People’s Republic of China

    Freedom Y. K. Leung

  7. Shaw College, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong

    Freedom Y. K. Leung

Authors
  1. Xianglong Zeng
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  2. Rong Wang
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  3. Tian P. S. Oei
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  4. Freedom Y. K. Leung
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Contributions

XZ and FL designed the study, XZ developed the training, XZ and RW collected and analyzed the data, and XZ and TO collaborated in the writing of the paper. All authors discussed the findings and reviewed and commented on the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Freedom Y. K. Leung.

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Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. The procedures were approved by Survey and Behavioral Research Ethics Committee in the Chinese University of Hong Kong and Shenzhen University. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Conflict of Interest

The first author of this article is the developer of the Heart of Joy program.

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Zeng, X., Wang, R., Oei, T.P.S. et al. Heart of Joy: a Randomized Controlled Trail Evaluating the Effect of an Appreciative Joy Meditation Training on Subjective Well-Being and Attitudes. Mindfulness 10, 506–515 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12671-018-0992-2

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