Do Group Mindfulness-Based Interventions Improve Emotion Regulation in Children? A Systematic Review

Emotion regulation is an essential component of prosocial behaviour and later life mental health outcomes. Group mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) have been shown to be effective at enhancing attention regulation and bodily awareness, skills necessary for efficient emotion regulation in children. We aimed to review the literature to determine whether MIB improved emotion regulation in children. Nine databases were systematically searched, yielding 502 papers. After removing duplicates and screening titles and abstracts, the inclusion criterium was applied to 68 full-text papers, leaving 15 eligible for inclusion. MBIs, including participants aged between 6 and 12 years old, and a quantitative post-intervention measure of emotion regulation were included. Data were extracted and synthesised following methodological quality assessment using PICO and Cochrane risk of bias tool. Data revealed mixed results regarding the efficacy of child-focused MBIs in improving emotion regulation. Results should be interpreted with caution due to disparate outcome measures of emotion regulation, mixed MBIs and poor methodological quality in many of the included studies. MBIs can be effective in improving ER in children. Further research is required to examine the effects in clinical samples with diverse baseline ER scores, determine the long-term effects of the MBIs, and explore moderators of treatment.