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Thinking Mindfully: How Mindfulness Relates to Rumination

January 18, 2021 by hw8w@virginia.edu

Investigators from Germany conducted studies with two groups (70 students and 149 from the general population) using smartphones to page the participants six times daily.  Each time they were paged, participants were prompted to fill out questionnaires regarding how much they were ruminating, two facets of mindfulness (present-moment awareness and non-judgmental acceptance), and their current states of positive and negative mood.  When individuals were in more mindful states, rumination was decreased.  Rumination was also less strongly associated with increases in negative mood and decreases in positive mood as both facets of mindfulness increased. These results suggest that mindfulness can both inhibit rumination and limit its negative impact on mood.

Blanke ES, Schmidt MJ, Riediger M. Emotion 2020;8:1369-81.

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