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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Mindfulness
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1539962
A cluster randomized controlled trial examining the effects of a four-week mindfulness-based practice on primary school students' interpersonal mindfulness, emotional intelligence, and attentional focus
Provisionally accepted- Ming Chi University of Technology, Taipei, Taiwan
Background: Although mindfulness benefits are well-established across diverse populations, its impact on primary school children's interpersonal mindfulness, emotional intelligence, and attentional focus remains underexplored. This study evaluated the effectiveness of a four-week mindfulness-based practice (MBP) intervention among primary school students. Methods: A cluster randomized controlled trial was conducted with 14 classes from Guanghua Elementary School, Taiwan. Classes were randomly assigned to either an intervention group (7 classes, n=123) or a control group (7 classes, n=158), encompassing middle and senior-grade male and female students. The intervention group participated in weekly 40-minute MBP sessions over four weeks. Students completed three validated questionnaires measuring interpersonal mindfulness dimensions (Presence, PR; Awareness, AW; Nonreactivity, NR), emotional intelligence (EI), and mindfulness (MI, attentional focus), using 6-point Likert scales. Assessments were administered at baseline, immediately after the intervention, and at a 8-week follow-up. Results: Baseline scores revealed no significant differences between the groups across all measures. After the 4-week intervention, the intervention group showed significant improvements in PR (p<0.01), NR (p<0.01), and MI (p<0.001) compared to the control group. At the 8-week follow-up, improvements in PR and MI were maintained, while NR gains diminished. Threeway ANOVA identified that gender and grade significantly influenced AW (p<0.01) and PR (p<0.05), respectively, with stage effects observed for NR and EI (p<0.05). Notably, the intervention enhanced AW among boys, and gender-grade interactions had a significant impact on NR and EI outcomes. Conclusions: Overall, the four-week MBP intervention significantly enhanced primary school students' interpersonal mindfulness and attentional focus, with some benefits lasting up to 8 weeks. These findings highlight the importance of tailoring MBP programs to students' developmental stages and gender-specific needs. Future studies should investigate longer interventions and incorporate objective measures to further validate these outcomes.
Keywords: Mindfulness-based practice (MBP), Cluster randomized controlled trial, Schoolchildren, Interpersonal mindfulness, Emotional Intelligence, attentional focus
Received: 05 Dec 2024; Accepted: 13 Feb 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Lin, Lin, Yu, Liu and Chen. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Yi-Lang Chen, Ming Chi University of Technology, Taipei, Taiwan
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