An Empirical Study Of The Role Of Mindfulness In Buffering Death Anxiety And Death

Mortality salience effects, which are an important part of the Terror Management Theory, refer to the phenomenon that people would strive for worldview, self-esteem, close relationship, etc after mortality salience, which is a defensive response to death anxiety aroused by mortality salience. In recent years, researchers propose that mindfulness have buffer function on mortality salience effects, which is not confirmed in domestic research yet. Meanwhile, the function of mindfulness to relax death anxiety is also deserved to be researched. The purpose of this study is to explore the mindful alleviation effect on death anxiety and verify its buffer function on mortality salience effects through the following two experiments.Study 1,100 college students, whom were divided into more mindful group and less mindful group, are the object of study, researchers manipulate the mortality salience through questionnaires, and then measure anxiety level both temporal and following, to investigate the mindful alleviation effect on death anxiety and try to explore the reaction stage.Study 2,115 individuals, whom were divided into more mindful group and less mindful group, are the object of study, researchers manipulate the mortality salience and neutral remind through questionnaires, and then take delay operation, to investigate the change of worldview defense through essay material. This study can verify the mindful buffer function on mortality salience effects in China.The results are as follows:(1) Mindfulness has alleviation effect on death anxiety. Compared with less mindful individuals, more mindful individuals show significantly lower anxiety level.(2) The alleviation effect of mindfulness on death anxiety is delayed rather than immediate. More mindful individuals show significantly lower anxiety level after mortality salience and delay operation.(3) Individuals show higher worldview defense in the condition of mortality salience, which verify the mortality salience hypothesis.(4) Less mindful individuals show higher worldview defense in the condition of mortality salience, yet more mindful individuals show fluctuation within a narrow range in tendency of endorse worldview under mortality salience and neutral remind, which verify the mindful buffer function on mortality salience effects in China.(5)Mindfulness alleviates death anxiety and buffer mortality salience effect only at the time after delay operation following mortality salience.