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An Experimental Test of the Mindfulness-to-Meaning Theory: Casual Pathways
Between Decentering, Reappraisal, and Well-being
Yiyi Wang
1
, Eric L. Garland
2
, and Norman A. S. Farb
1, 3
1
Department of Psychology, University of Toronto Mississauga
2
Center on Mindfulness and Integrative Health Intervention Development, College of Social Work, University of Utah
3
Department of Psychological Clinical Science, University of Toronto Scarborough
Emotion regulation ideally promotes subjective well-being in addition to relieving distress. Mindfulness-to-
Meaning theory (MMT) proposes that well-being interventions follow a common pathway to promote well-
ness using two intermediate stages: decentering from initial stress appraisals followed by positive reap-
praisal of life events—linking a broadened state of awareness with narrative meaning-making. A
preregistered (https://osf.io/c2xzd) evaluation of the MMT compared online, 3-week adaptations of estab-
lished well-being interventions in a postsecondary student sample. The study (N=131) employed a four-
arm randomized trial design, featuring (a) control, (b) mindfulness, (c) stress mindset, and (d) blended mind-
fulness and stress mindset training conditions. The MMT pathway accounted forchange in well-being across
all models, mindfulness training consistently promoted positive reappraisal despite an absence of reappraisal
instructions, and an exploratory cross-lagged analysis found decentering facilitative of subsequent reap-
praisal. However, the stress mindset intervention failed to improve well-being relative to control, limiting
capacity for causal inference; post hoc analyses, therefore, focused on the more efficacious mindfulness
training conditions. The MMT accounted for change in well-being across all levels of analysis, although
well-being changes were also supported by direct effects of mindfulness training and decentering, with
only partial mediation through the complete MMT pathway. These findings support MMT as a process
model for well-being but suggest that decentering and reappraisal only partially account for the salutary
effects of well-being interventions.
Keywords: mindfulness, decentering, reappraisal, well-being, mindfulness-to-meaning theory
Supplemental materials: https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0001252.supp
Well-being has been characterized as a state of high positive affect
(PA), low negative affect, and high life satisfaction (Larsen, 2022). In
contrast to clinical accounts that enumerate dimensions of distress,
well-being is situated within a continuum anchored by languishing
and flourishing, indicating a person’s level of positive and meaningful
engagement with life (Keyes, 2007). Well-being interventions aim to
promote flourishing,yet in comparison toextensive scholarship on the
mechanisms for symptom reduction in clinical psychology (e.g.,
Abramowitz & Deacon, 2010;Gruber et al., 2021), the central mech-
anisms supporting flourishing are underspecified in the research
literature. For example, Self-Determination Theory suggests that
flourishing is characterized by levels of competence, autonomy, and
relatedness to others (Ryan et al., 2019), yet how one fosters these
adaptive qualities is less clear (Gillison et al., 2019).
Well-being promotion is supported by a new generation of candi-
date interventions, such as connecting with nature (Capaldi et al.,
2015), mindset training (Jamieson et al., 2018), positive psychology
interventions (Sin & Lyubomirsky, 2009;White et al., 2019), and
contemplative approaches such as mindfulness (Gu et al., 2015)
and yoga (Breedvelt et al., 2019). Yet despite the proliferation of
This article was published Online First May 11, 2023.
Yiyi Wang https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2198-581X
Eric L. Garland is the Director of the Center on Mindfulness and Integrative
Health Intervention Development. The center provides Mindfulness-Oriented
Recovery Enhancement (MORE), mindfulness-based therapy, and cognitive
behavioral therapy in the context of research trials for no cost to research par-
ticipants; however, Eric L. Garland has received honoraria and payment for
delivering seminars, lectures, and teaching engagements (related to training cli-
nicians in MORE), including those sponsored by institutions of higher educa-
tion, government agencies, academic teaching hospitals, and medical centers.
Eric L. Garland also receives royalties from the sale of books related to MORE.
Eric L. Garland has also been a consultant and licensor to BehaVR, LLC.
Eric L. Garland received funding from NIH and Norman A.S. Farb
received funding from Canadian Natural Sciences and Engineering Council
(NSERC) Discovery.
The data were preregistered at: https://osf.io/c2xzd
Yiyi Wang served as lead for data curation, formal analysis, investiga-
tion, methodology, and project administration. Eric L. Garland served in a
supporting role for funding acquisition, writing–original draft, and writ-
ing–review and editing. Norman A. S. Farb served as lead for funding
acquisition, supervision, and contributed equally to formal analysis and
methodology. Yiyi Wang, Eric L. Garland, and Norman A. S. Farb con-
tributed to conceptualization equally. Yiyi Wang, Eric L. Garland, and
Norman A. S. Farb contributed to writing–original draft, writing–review
and editing, and visualization equally.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Yiyi Wang,
Department of Psychology, University of Toronto Mississauga, 3359
Mississauga Road, Mississauga, ON L5L 1C6, Canada. Email: yiyiw
.wang@mail.utoronto.ca
Emotion
© 2023 American Psychological Association 2023, Vol. 23, No. 8, 2243–2258
ISSN: 1528-3542 https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0001252
2243
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