A Multisite Pre/Post Study of Mindfulness Training for Therapists: The Impact on Session Presence and Effectiveness.

Background: To date, little research has tested whether the use of mindfulness by clinicians results in actual changes in psychotherapy sessions. The purpose of this multisite study was to test whether a brief 5-week mindfulness training program could lead to improved session presence and effectiveness for trainee clinicians ( = 31).

Methods: At the end of 85 pretraining and 132 posttraining sessions, clients completed the client version of the Therapist Presence Inventory (TPI-C; Geller, Greenberg, & Watson, 2010) and the Session Rating Scale (SRS; Johnson, Miller, & Duncan, 2000).

Results: Although the levels of client-rated presence did not differ between pretraining and posttraining sessions, sessions that occurred after the training were rated by clients as more effective compared to the pretraining sessions, (170.91) = 2.63, = .01, = .30.

Conclusions: This study provides preliminary session outcome evidence supporting mindfulness training for clinicians.