- Title
- Dispositional mindfulness and emotion regulation as mediators of the attachment and psychological distress relationship
- Creator
- Buller, Callie J.
- Relation
- University of Newcastle Research Higher Degree Thesis
- Resource Type
- thesis
- Date
- 2016
- Description
- Masters Research - Master of Clinical Psychology (MClinPsych)
- Description
- Scope: Previous research has shown that significant relationships exist between the constructs of attachment, psychological health, mindfulness, and emotion regulation. It is well established that attachment security influences an individual’s dispositional mindfulness, which in turn mediates the relationship between attachment and psychological health (Ryan, Brown & Creswell, 2007) and that emotion regulation mediates the relationship between attachment and psychological well-being. Further more, emotion regulation can account for the differences in mindfulness and attachment security (Pepping, Davis & O’Donovan, 2013). However, so far no model has been evaluated that predicts the relationship between all four constructs. Purpose: The present study was designed to evaluate a model in which it was expected that mindfulness and emotion regulation would partially mediate the relationship between attachment insecurity and psychological distress. There were three main aims of the study: (1) to examine the particular relationship between attachment, psychological distress and mindfulness, (2) to examine the relationship between attachment, psychological distress and emotion regulation, and (3) to examine the mediation effects of mindfulness and emotion regulation on the relationship between attachment and psychological distress. Methodology: 211 individuals were recruited from the general public and the Hunter Medical Research Institute (HMRI) volunteer database. The mean age of participants was 38.8 years (SD = 15.2), with 165 females and 46 males. An on-line questionnaire, which was part of a larger study, was administered using Lime Survey software. The questionnaire took approximately 40-60 minutes to complete and included a number of different measures, some of which were not relevant for the current study. Within this study, the following questionnaires were analyzed; The Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ: Baer et al., 2006); The Attachment Styles Questionnaire (ASQ; Feeney, Noller & Hanrahan, 1994); The Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS; Gratz & Roemer, 2004) and the Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale – 21 (DASS-21; Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995a, 1995b) as a measure of psychological distress. Results: To examine the mediation hypotheses the indirect effects in the model were examined. The standardised indirect effects of attachment anxiety on psychological distress and emotion regulation were .360 [95% CI: .240, .490] and .311 [95% CI: .236, .400] respectively. The former path supports a fully mediated link between attachment anxiety and psychological distress. The standardised indirect effect of mindfulness on psychological distress was -.304 [95% CI: -.398, -.226] indicating that emotion regulation fully mediates the path between these two variables. There was also an indirect effect of attachment avoidance on psychological distress of .064 [95% CI: .006, .126], which, while significant, was so weak as to be considered a non-effect. This indicates that emotion regulation does not mediate the path from attachment avoidance to psychological distress. Conclusions: Correlations indicated that there were significant relationships between all constructs and the overall results of the SEM supported a modified version of the proposed partial mediation model. The main difference between the proposed and final model is the absence of direct effects between attachment anxiety and psychological distress and between mindfulness and psychological distress. The correlations showed a strong, positive relationship between attachment anxiety and psychological distress. However contrary to expectations, in the final model there is no direct effect between these two constructs. The relationship between attachment anxiety and psychological distress appears to be fully mediated by two indirect effects; one through emotion regulation, and the other through emotion regulation and mindfulness. Consistent with theory, both mindfulness and attachment anxiety are implicated in emotion regulation abilities (Pepping, Davis & O’Donovan, 2013) indicating that the relationship between attachment anxiety and psychological distress can be accounted for by emotion regulation and mindfulness abilities. Implications of the larger work: The findings from the present study extend on prior research and add to the understanding of mindfulness and emotion regulation by revealing that that the associations between attachment anxiety and psychological distress may be fully mediated by mindfulness and emotion regulation. The current study provides a platform for future research to explore the impact of interventions aimed at improving emotion regulation and mindfulness abilities in a general, non-clinical population, specifically in the context of attachment insecurity. As we know, insecure attachment can have a profound effect on levels of psychological distress and well-being with the greater implications of this being a higher risk of psychopathology and lowered health outcomes (Karreman & Vingerhoets, 2012; La Guardia, Ryan, Couchman & Deci, 2000; Lavy & Littman-Ovadia, 2011). This study provides promising insights into the importance of emotion regulation and mindfulness abilities. In addition, focus and direction for the development of interventions aimed at strengthening these skills, and thus potential influences on the psychological well-being of the general population are inferred.
- Subject
- mindfulness; emotion regulation; attachment; thesis by publication
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1313024
- Identifier
- uon:22509
- Rights
- Copyright 2016 Callie J. Buller
- Language
- eng
- Full Text
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