Prompting to Practice: Daily Practice Mediates the Benefits of Supplement to a Mindfulness-Based Intervention

Theoretically, home practice of mindfulness is a critical mechanism underlying the benefits of mindfulness-based intervention (MBI), but rates of adherence to home practice recommendations are low for youth participants in MBI. In the current study, we test the extent to which the first supplement delivered via cellphone to an MBI increases rates of home practice, and to what extent home practice mediates condition differences in key outcomes (mindful attention, psychological distress, depressive symptoms, and difficulties in emotion regulation). Participants were 59 university students who attended at least one session of a 6-week MBI and completed daily diaries assessing home practice and outcomes. Participants were randomly assigned to receive varying intervention support between sessions; we compared those who received no support to those who received support. Results indicated that those who received the MBI plus multi-modal adaptive supplement in daily life reported significantly higher rates of home practice, relative to those who received only the MBI. In addition, there were indirect effects of condition on mindful attention, psychological distress, depressive symptoms, and emotion regulation difficulties through home practice. This study provides preliminary evidence that incorporating supplements to MBI may increase intervention effectiveness by supporting and boosting home practice of mindfulness.