UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Mindfulness — a practice of maintaining a moment-by-moment awareness of thoughts, emotions, bodily sensations and surrounding environment — has become increasingly popular in recent years, especially in schools, according to U.S. News. A doctoral candidate in the Penn State College of Education is researching how mindfulness practices, aided by wearable technology, can help support students historically underrepresented in STEM, or science, technology, engineering and math, successfully transition to college. Over the summer, she partnered with two Penn State programs designed to help ease the transition to college for first-year students to test the effectiveness of the technology.
“I think mindfulness is one way we can support students’ social and emotional well-being,” said Marisa DeCollibus, who is pursuing a doctorate in school psychology. “I’m interested in mindfulness as tool to develop self-awareness and identity.”
DeCollibus received a Varela Grant from the Mind & Life Institute to support her project, “Cultivating early adults’ flourishing with mindfulness training & technology-assisted skill transfer: A pilot comparative effectiveness trial.” She received additional funding from the Society of School Psychology Dissertation Grant Awards.
The purpose of the study, according to DeCollibus, is to provide a mindfulness intervention to students as they transition to college and to help students continue to use mindfulness practices outside of the intervention context. For her study, DeCollibus partnered with RiSE UP, a six-week academic enhancement program administered by the Eberly College of Science, Office of Diversity and Inclusion; and the Engineering Summer Bridge Program, an academic summer program under the Multicultural Engineering Program designed to help incoming first-year students prepare for their engineering major.
Prior research has indicated there is a vacuum in mental health services for college students. A 2021 study by the American College Health Association found that 48% of college students reported moderate or severe psychological stress, 53% reported being lonely and 25% had considered suicide. Research published in 2014 in the Journal of College Counseling suggests that these challenges were more pronounced for first-generation college students, who are often less likely to seek out and receive mental health support services. While other Penn State researchers previously concluded in the Journal of American College Health that mindfulness is an effective strategy in reducing the stress of first-year students college students, its effectiveness is unknown for Black, Indigenous and other people from non-majority backgrounds, including those who are the first in their families to attend college.
In her study, DeCollibus employed a comparative effectiveness trial to examine the efficacy of integrating a mindfulness-based program into existing Penn State summer bridge programs. She also evaluated the potential benefits of using technology-assisted skill generalization strategies to help students apply their skills to everyday life.
As part of the program, DeCollibus utilized Just Breathe, a modification of Learning to BREATHE, a mindfulness-based curriculum created for classroom or group settings, adapted for college students.
“A lot of summer bridge programs focus on academic preparation and campus resources but there’s often not a mental health or wellness component ingrained into these programs,” DeCollibus said. “We’re providing this Just Breathe intervention for emerging adults to college-age students.”
According to DeCollibus, a common issue with mindfulness interventions is there are few built-in mechanisms for helping students retain the skills they have learned.
“The first component is looking at how we can support students using mindfulness skills they’re learning in an intervention outside of the intervention context,” she said.
In the summer bridge programs, students utilized all-day stress tracking technology through the Garmin smartwatches they were provided in class. The scientifically validated Firstbeat Analytics engine primarily used a combination of heart rate and heart rate variability data — recorded by the device’s optical heart rate sensor — to estimate stress levels from zero to 100, which the students could see and mitigate.
In this study, DeCollibus focused on how to implement the methodology rather than testing to see if the intervention was effective. The overall goal for this line of research, however, is to help students modify their behavior based on their interpretation of the data, DeCollibus said.
“As a researcher, I’m interested if that aid of self-awareness with the stress monitoring features helps you practice your skills… maybe this is a good time for a mindful breath?” DeCollibus said. “That’s an innovative component of the project that hasn’t been done before.”
According to Lauren Griggs, director of the Multicultural Engineering Program, the stress management course not only helps students understand their stressors, but it also complements their other coursework.
“The stress management course has been a great way to elevate what the students learn in their metacognition course,” Griggs said. The metacognition course aims to help students better understand their own thought processes. “They have learned practical ways to implement mindfulness so that their wellness is centered while they navigate their academic trajectories.”
Kennedy Morrison, program coordinator for the Office of Diversity & Inclusion in the Eberly College of Science, said that the students in the RiSE UP program had a positive response to the wearable technology.
“It integrated pretty seamlessly into their daily routines and was very unobtrusive and convenient,” she said. “I believe that the mindfulness curriculum along with the metacognitive elements the students learned during the program all contributed to increased emotional maturity, self-awareness and also stress regulation behaviors.”
DeCollibus is still sifting through the data she collected in the study, but she has her sights set on scaling the work.
“I'll be focusing on the analysis and potential publications, as well as how to improve the research protocol for a larger study someday,” DeCollibus said.
For DeCollibus, she said the experience of working on the mindfulness project at Penn State has been “very full circle.” During her senior year in high school, she became acquainted with the research of Jennifer Frank, associate professor of education concentrating on special education and educational psychology, Penn State College of Education. Frank’s research interests include school-based prevention, positive behavior supports, innovative statistical and experimental methods to validate evidence-based interventions, social-emotional learning and mindfulness-based interventions.
As an undergraduate student at the University of Rhode Island, DeCollibus first began cultivating her interest in mindfulness and, more broadly, social emotional learning — a methodology that aims to help students of all ages to better comprehend their emotions, feel those emotions fully and demonstrate empathy for others. During that time, she worked as a mindfulness instructor with Center for Resilience, a nonprofit organization, in which she engaged elementary students in mindfulness activities during the school day. As a research assistant for the Science Education and Society Research Lab at the University of Rhode Island, she tested the efficacy of the Center for Resilience curriculum as part of her honors project. She also interned for the Rhode Island Department of Education’s Office of Student, Community and Academic Supports to survey the social emotional programs used in the state.
DeCollibus applied the knowledge she gained as an undergraduate student while working as a postsecondary adviser for a Rhode Island high school for two years after receiving her bachelor’s degree. She then applied for the doctoral program at Penn State, where Frank became her mentor.
“The summer bridge project comes from that passion I developed working in a Rhode Island high school,” DeCollibus said. “I think the experience I had there has informed almost everything I’ve done since. I feel very grateful to be able to work with Dr. Frank.”
In her doctoral studies, DeCollibus said she would like to continue to study how contemplative practices can support well-being in society.