Growing by Letting Go: Nonattachment and Mindfulness as Qualities of Advanced Psychological Development

A brief nonattachment intervention based on the three marks of existence: development, rationale, and initial evidence

BACKGROUND

The practices described in Buddhist philosophy are essentially a suite of non-theistic cognitive and behavioral interventions designed to induce nonattachment (N-A), which can be defined in terms of the absence of a need for one's personal reality to be other than it is. Although meditative practices have received attention in multiple literatures, the cognitive analogs to these behaviorally-oriented practices have not.

DESIGN

Two experiments involving undergraduate participants (total N = 239; M age = 19.04) investigated whether the provision of wisdom related to the Three Marks of Existence (i.e., some degree of suffering is inevitable, there is impermanence, and many events are not in our control) could result in (1) higher nonattachment attitudes, (2) lower threat appraisals, (3) lower stressor reactivity, and (4) shorter emotion reaction durations.

RESULTS

With moderate to large effect sizes, the Three Marks trainings (relative to placebo or control conditions) resulted in (1) higher nonattachment attitudes, (2) lower threat appraisals, (3) no differences in negative emotional intensity, but 4) shorter emotion durations.

CONCLUSIONS

These results provide preliminary evidence that enduring cognitive trainings such as the Three Marks can be an effective tool to increase acceptance-related attitudes while attenuating negative reactivity.

Integration of Psychosocial Theory into Palliative Care: Implications for Care Planning and Early Palliative Care

Palliative care improves patients' symptoms, quality of life and family satisfaction with caregiving, reduces hospital admissions and promotes alignment of medical care with the patient's needs and goals. This article proposes the utility of integrating three psychosocial theories into standard palliative care with implications for care planning, early palliative care and optimizing quality of life. First, Control Theory focuses on the complex juxtaposition of promoting agency/empowerment in patients and carers and coping with often highly uncertain outcomes. Second, Optimal Matching Theory accounts for the alignment of need and provision of care to potentiate the quality of life effects of supportive care in a complex social process involving health care providers, patients and carers. Third, Hope Theory represents a dynamic process, which is marked by variation in the qualities of hope as the patient and carer confront challenges during palliative care. Future work will be translational in nature to adapt both assessment and interventions based on this theoretically driven augmentation of palliative care as well as to evaluate whether it provides a conceptual framework that has incremental utility in palliative care planning.

Weaving Together the Ancient and the Contemporary: Intersections of the Bhagavad Gita with Modern Psychology

The Bhagavad Gita is a well-known and deeply respected ancient text from the Indian subcontinent. It is widely regarded as a storehouse of spiritual knowledge. This article explores the different ways in which psychologists have approached the study of the Gita and the extent to which it has been acknowledged as providing concepts that can contribute to the creation of mental well-being in modern times. It is important to understand the status accorded to the Gita within psychology and the contributions it can make to the growth of the psychological sciences. Psychology as we know it today developed largely within the academic institutions of Europe and North America and began its steep rise to recognition and fame largely in the first half of the 20th century. Western 'scientific' theories, concepts, and writings were carried to and widely disseminated in countries with diverse cultures. In this process indigenous, cultural and philosophical forms of knowledge that could have been incorporated into the evolving discipline were largely ignored or marginalized. The time has come to begin an exploration of such resources to assess how they can contribute to enhancing psychology's acceptance in different parts of the world. Given psychology's wide base of applications, it would be beneficial to explore its links with the message of the Bhagavad Gita. This study presents an analysis of 24 articles on the Bhagavad Gita that are of psychological significance and have been published in the last 10 years (2012-2022). Three themes addressing the ways in which this text has been approached by contemporary psychologists were elicited: (1) comparisons with modern psychotherapy, (2) preludes to modern psychological concepts and (3) potential for building well-being and resilience. In addition to this analysis, the article explores a powerful message contained in the Gita around seeking support for mental health issues, a message that has not been widely recognized to date.

Nonattachment mediates the associations between mindfulness, well-being, and psychological distress: A meta-analytic structural equation modeling approach

Research on nonattachment, a Buddhist psychological construct closely related to mindfulness, has burgeoned since the development of the Nonattachment Scale. The aim of the current meta-analysis was to investigate the mediating role of nonattachment in the relationship between mindfulness and well-being and psychological distress using a meta-analytic structural equation modeling approach. The respective associations of nonattachment and mindfulness with well-being and psychological distress, after controlling for each other, were also examined. Forty-one independent cross-sectional data sets with 24,704 individuals were coded. Results showed that nonattachment partially mediated the associations between mindfulness and well-being and psychological distress. Nonattachment and mindfulness were both significantly positively associated with well-being and negatively associated with psychological distress after controlling for each other. Given the present findings were based on cross-sectional data, more studies with rigorous research design, such as longitudinal, experimental, and intervention studies, should be conducted to further investigate the mediating effect of nonattachment between mindfulness with well-being and distress outcomes and establish causal relations between them. Future research directions regarding nonattachment and its application in mindfulness-based interventions were discussed.

The Relationship Between Mindful Agency and Self-Leadership of Chinese Private College Undergraduates: Mediating Effect of Metacognitive Ability

As one of 21st century key skills, self-leadership is not only the internal factor of private college undergraduates' independent development, but also related to the quality improvement of talent cultivation of private undergraduate colleges. It is proved that mindfulness or metacognition separately has the predictive effect on self-leadership, but their structural relationships has not been revealed. The present study explored the interrelations between mindful agency, metacognitive ability, and self-leadership through the mediation analysis with structural equation modeling, and bootstrapping was conducted to test the mediating effect. The sample comprised 1,244 private undergraduate sophomore (38.4% male and 61.6% female), and they completed online questionnaires of mindful agency, metacognitive ability, and self-leadership. The results revealed that mindful agency of private undergraduate students not only directly and positively predicted self-leadership, but also indirectly and positively predicted self-leadership through the mediating effect of metacognitive ability. Metacognitive ability partially mediated the relationship between mindful agency and self-leadership. The direct effect of mindful agency and the mediating effect of metacognitive ability, respectively, account for 86.9% and 13.1% of the total effect. The results suggest that the more mindful private college undergraduates are, the more willing they are to practise their metacognitive skills in their learning, and the more progress in self-leadership they make. Educational implications for mindfulness training and metacognition practice to foster their self-leadership are discussed.

Relationships Between Mindfulness Facets and Mental and Physical Health in Meditating and Nonmeditating University Students

Abstract. Background: Little is known about the relations of the mindfulness facets to mental and physical health among meditators and nonmeditators. Aim: The main purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between the mindfulness facets and mental as well as physical health of university students with and without meditation experience using attentional control, body awareness, nonattachment, and emotion regulation as mediators. Method: Data were collected from a sample of 508 university students (meditators: n = 195, nonmeditators n = 313). Path analysis models were used to examine the associations between the mindfulness facets, all candidate mediators and the outcome variables mental and physical health complaints. Additionally, a bootstrapping procedure was used to test the significance of the indirect effects. Results: Results showed that the associations between the mindfulness facets, the proposed mediators, and mental and physical health complaints were similar between students with and without meditation experience. Nonattachment and body awareness were the most important mediators. Limitations: Only self-report questionnaires were used in the study, and the majority of the sample was women and enrolled in health and social science studies. Conclusion: The results indicated that the investigation of mindfulness at the facet level is worthwhile. The study helps to clarify the associations between the mindfulness facets and mental as well as physical health among students with and without meditation experience. Further, mindfulness mediators should be examined in intervention studies.

The relative benefits of nonattachment to self and self-compassion for psychological distress and psychological well-being for those with and without symptoms of depression

OBJECTIVES

Self-compassion represents a way of interacting with the self involving kindness and a balanced approach to negative self-related stimuli that has shown to contribute to reduced depression, anxiety and stress, and increased psychological well-being. Due to the potential barriers towards self-compassion for people with depressive symptoms, the objective of the present study what to investigate whether the emerging construct of 'nonattachment to self', which reflects a flexible and balanced approach to all self-related stimuli, may be more beneficial for positive psychological outcomes than self-compassion, for individuals with depressive symptoms.

METHOD

A sample 388 participants (consisting of 71 men, 317 women) aged from 18 to 77 (M = 35.33, SD = 10.81) completed an online questionnaire measuring levels of self-compassion, nonattachment to self, depressive symptoms, and well-being.

RESULTS

Higher levels of both nonattachment to self and self-compassion were related to reduced psychological distress and increased psychological well-being. However, for people with at least mild depressive symptoms, nonattachment to self was found to be a stronger predictor of reduced psychological distress and increased psychological well-being than self-compassion.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, the present study suggests both nonattachment to self and self-compassion are associated with better mental health in non-clinical populations. Further, for individuals experiencing at least mild symptoms of depression, self-compassion may be less beneficial than taking a more nonattached stance towards the self. The findings have implications for the way we conceptualize self-focused attention and suggest assisting individuals to let go of their fixated, self-focused attention may be especially beneficial for individuals with depressive symptoms.

PRACTITIONER POINTS

The notion of letting of attachment to the separate static self lies at the core of Buddhist psychological teachings and recent research suggests it can have a positive impact on individuals psychological well-being and ill-being Given the barriers to self-compassion experienced by individuals with depressive symptoms, nonattachment to self may represent a healthy interaction with the self than is met with less resistance than self-compassion. Due to the balanced stance of nonattachment to self towards positive and negative self-related stimuli, it may be prove to be a valuable approach to treating individuals who feel conflict with taking any form of positive or kind stance towards the self.

Non-attachment and happiness: mediating versus moderating roles of grit personality

Background

Studies have revealed that grit personality and non-attachment are positively associated with happiness. Grittier people are happier while they persist in pursuing their long-term goal, whereas non-attached people are hap-pier as they are not clinging onto any object. These contrasting findings seem to suggest that the two concepts may have some relevancies. Accordingly, this study aims to use the mediator and moderator models to exam-ine whether grit personality either moderates or mediates the effects of non-attachment on happiness.

Participants and procedure

Three hundred sixty undergraduates were recruited by the purposive sampling method to participate in a survey. They needed to fill in the Short Grit Scale, Non-Attachment Scale and Subjective Happiness Scale.

Results

The results showed that non-attachment is positively associated with a component of grit; that only persever-ance of efforts, but not consistency of interest, was positively associated with non-attachment. In addition, per-severance of efforts mediates rather than moderates the effects of non-attachment on happiness.

Conclusions

The findings suggesting that non-attached people are happier does not mean they detach from life. They are able to work with perseverance on their long-term goals, but they do not attach to the outcome of their goals. The findings provide further conceptual clarification of grit personality and non-attachment and further infor-mation to educators and program managers while designing programs to improve happiness.