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The Relationship Between Mindfulness and Happiness in Student-Athletes: The Role of Self-Compassion—Mediator or Moderator?

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Abstract

In the present study, the mediating and moderating role of self-compassion in the relationship between mindfulness and happiness was examined through Structural Equation Modeling in student-athletes. Three hundred sixty-three individual and team-sport athletes (63.9% male; 35.8% female; 0.3% non-binary, Mage = 21.51 SD = 3.33) participating in the study were asked to fill out the Mindfulness Inventory for Sport, the Self-Compassion Scale, and the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire. There were significant positive correlations between mindfulness, self-compassion, and happiness. Structural equation modeling revealed that self-compassion did not have a moderator role in the relationship between mindfulness and happiness. On the other hand, self-compassion played a fully mediating role in the relationship between mindfulness and happiness in student-athletes. While these are correlational data that do not permit causal inferences, these findings raise the possibility, in this population, that advances a better understanding of the impact mechanism of mindfulness on happiness.

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Article writing: EOT (Introduction/Method/Discussion/Limitations), SS (Data analysis/Result). MAE (Ethical Approval/Data collecting), BG (Data collecting).

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Correspondence to Serdar Solmaz.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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The study design complies with the Declaration of Helsinki (World Medical Association, 2013) ethical standards. The ethics committee approval for the present study was obtained from the Scientific Research and Publication Ethics Committee of the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities at Hatay Mustafa Kemal University (Approval No: 21817443-050.99).

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Participants were reached via google form and participation was achieved. In addition, participant information letter was added.

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Tingaz, E.O., Solmaz, S., Ekiz, M.A. et al. The Relationship Between Mindfulness and Happiness in Student-Athletes: The Role of Self-Compassion—Mediator or Moderator?. J Rat-Emo Cognitive-Behav Ther 40, 75–85 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10942-021-00397-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10942-021-00397-0

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