The Impact of Baseline Mindfulness Scores on Mindfulness-Based Intervention Outcomes: Toward Personalized Mental Health Interventions

Abstract

A growing body of evidence has portrayed mindfulness as a useful tool for dealing with a broad range of psychological problems and disorders. This has created the impression that mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) can be used to treat nearly all psychological difficulties, in all cases. Nonetheless, little research has been done on how individual differences may contribute to intervention outcomes. The goal of this study was to evaluate the role of baseline mindfulness on participants’ outcomes by examining three prior Randomized Controlled Trials that addressed the impact of MBIs on mental health and mindfulness measures. The participants were 164 people, aged between 12 and 45, from both clinical and non-clinical samples. Our findings indicate that at least two thirds of the change produced by these interventions in terms of mindfulness scores can be predicted by the baseline scores of the same variables. We also found that many trajectories are not only strongly influenced by the initial status of the participants, but also by the intervention performed, as attested to by the significant interactions found. These results stress the need to continue doing research in a way that considers the diversity of participants’ trajectories, increasing the room for intervention improvements aligned with a more personalized health care model.