Benefits of dispositional mindfulness among adolescents: relationship with academic emotions and academic engagement

Academic achievement, as one of the main tasks for adolescents, could be affected by mindfulness mindset. However, there is limited investigation into relative importance of different mindfulness dimensions to academic engagement and the underlying emotion-related mechanisms among adolescents. This study first examined the relative importance of five mindfulness facets on academic engagement and then explored the mediating role of academic emotions (enjoyment, calm, anxiety, and exhaustion-upset) in the relationship between mindfulness and academic engagement. A total of 713 (52.5% male; M_age= 12.81, SD = 0.69) Chinese junior high school students completed a set of questionnaires assessing mindfulness, academic emotions and academic engagement in classroom settings. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to examine relationships between five dimensions of mindfulness and academic engagement, as well as the mediating role of academic emotions between mindfulness and academic engagement. Results showed that four mindfulness facets were positively correlated with academic engagement, except for non-judging of inner experiences showing a negative association. Among the five mindfulness facets, acting with awareness was the strongest predictor of academic engagement. In addition, academic enjoyment and exhaustion-upset mediated the association of mindfulness with academic engagement respectively, and the mediation effect size of exhaustion-upset was larger than enjoyment. These findings emphasize the unique roles of five mindfulness dimensions in academic settings, stress the need for a nuanced understanding of mindfulness facets when designing interventions, and encourages mindfulness-based interventions to relieve academic exhaustion-upset and enhance academic enjoyment so as to improve adolescents’ academic engagement.