Body Shame-Based Model Using Mindfulness and Mediating Role of Self-Compassion in Patients with Cancer

Introduction: Patients experience cognitive, emotional, psychological, and physiological disruptions as well as body shame as a result of the emergence of physiological disorders such as cancer and the treatment process. Accordingly, the present study aimed to identify a structural model of body shame based on mindfulness, with the mediating role of self-compassion in people with cancer.Methods: The applied research was conducted based on correlation through structural equation modeling. The statistical population included individuals with cancer disease who were referred to Bandar Abbas Medical Centers in 2022. In this research, 200 patients with cancer were selected using the available sampling method. The research instruments were the Body Shame Questionnaire (Duarte et al, 2015), the Mindfulness Skills Questionnaire (Baer, Smith, Allen, 2004), and the Self-Compassion Questionnaire (Neff, 2003). SPSS software and Amos software were used to analyze the data using structural equation modeling.Results: The results showed that mindfulness had a significant direct effect on self-compassion and body shame of people with cancer, accounting for 21.3% and 25.3% of the variance of these variables, respectively. Besides, self-compassion had a significant direct effect on the body shame of people with cancer, which also accounted for 22.1% of the variance of this variable. Self-compassion had a significant mediating role in the relationship between mindfulness and body shame (P<0.05).Conclusion: Considering the significant mediating role of self-compassion, the occurrence of body shame in people with cancer could be reduced by implementing effective interventions, such as self-compassion training. Since self-compassion could act as a buffer against the effects of negative events. Individuals with self-compassion accepted negative life events more easily, and their self-evaluations and reactions were more accurate and based on their performance.