ABSTRACT
The mental health crisis across college campuses is accelerating, with anxiety listed as the top mental health issue for undergraduate college students. Although evidence suggests the COVID-19 pandemic escalated the mental health crisis on college campuses, pre-COVID-19 anxiety among college students was on the rise. Research supports Mindfulness Based Interventions (MBIs) to reduce anxiety among college students. Additionally, exposure to natural environments, which are accessible to students on college campuses, is effective in reducing anxiety. While brief nature-based mindfulness interventions appear effective in reducing anxiety among college students, these interventions are often offered in isolation without social interaction among group members and lack intentional integration of mindfulness and nature-related theories. The purpose of this work is to describe a framework for integrating the use of Mindfulness and Attention Restoration Theory (ART) in an innovative psychoeducational group intervention, Nature-Based Mindfulness Training © (NBMT), for college students with anxiety. In conclusion, we argue for the need to intentionally integrate mindfulness and nature into nature-based mindfulness interventions as an effective and sustainable means to reduce anxiety. Limitations and areas for future research are described.
Subject(s)
COVID-19 , Mindfulness , Humans , Pandemics , Students/psychology , Anxiety/prevention & control , Anxiety/psychologyABSTRACT
School counselors are vital in crisis prevention and intervention. In this article, we discuss the unified educator–counselor identity as it informs the suicide prevention work of school counselors, illustrated with a data-based case example from a quantitative study based in one high school. This case example includes a decision tree to show how school counselors can use data to understand the suicide prevention and intervention needs of a diverse student body in their own schools.