Background: The practice of mindfulness meditation has gained increasing attention to manage stress levels and enhance cognitive functions. Mindfulness meditation has demonstrated enhancement effects in protecting mental health by modulating autonomic nervous system activity and improving attentional control. However, the effectiveness of physical mindfulness breathing meditation (PMBM) and online mindfulness breathing meditation (OMBM) interventions on stress levels, state mindfulness, and cognitive functions has remained largely unexplored. This study aims to examine the effects of PMBM and OMBM interventions, with an active control (AC) group on state mindfulness and cognitive functions (attention and inhibitory control) and using heart rate variability (HRV) as a measurement of stress levels. An interview was conducted to gain participants’ understanding and attitudes toward practicing mindfulness breathing meditation (MBM) on enhancing their mental health.
Methods: Forty-eight participants were randomly assigned to either PMBM, OMBM, or AC groups. During the pre-intervention task, the HRV of the participants was measured for 5 minutes during resting state, and then they answered the Toronto Mindfulness Scale (TMS) and performed the Flanker task. Participants underwent a 3-day intervention with 10 minutes of PMBM or OMBM practices, or music therapy (for the AC group). The post-intervention procedure was the same as the pre-intervention. Among the PMBM and OMBM participants, 20 participants were randomly selected to undergo the interview.
Results: The findings showed significantly higher curiosity and de-centering scores (P<0.001) in state mindfulness using TMS, and improvement in reaction time (P=0.01) and Flanker effect (P=0.03) using the Flanker task, in both PMBM and OMBM groups compared to the AC group, though no significant improvement in HRV (all P>0.05). The interview findings suggested that MBM intervention, regardless of the delivery mode, offered a feasible, accessible, and beneficial mindfulness modality to the general population, particularly suitable for beginners.
Conclusions: This study supports the adaptability and acceptability of MBM intervention across different delivery formats, making it a promising tool for large-scale mental health promotion. However, the null findings of HRV suggested that brief MBM intervention did not induce changes in autonomic function. Future research could explore longer intervention durations and include follow-up assessments to examine sustained effects.
