Emotion Regulation and Mindfulness in Aboriginal Out-of-Home-Care Children

Georgia Lee Rowland

Emotion regulation is the process of influencing an individual’s emotions, when they have them, and how they experience and express them. Emotion regulation is central to mental health, with emotion dysregulation at the core of many psychological disorders. Individuals can utilise adaptive and maladaptive emotion regulation strategies, but those with adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) often rely on maladaptive strategies. Children in out-of-home care (OOHC) due to maltreatment or exposure to ACEs, are consequently at risk of poor mental health, low academic achievement, and further negative later-life sequelae. Many of these negative later-life sequelae are underpinned by high rates of emotion dysregulation. Mindfulness has been emphasised as a key component to the development of emotion regulation. Despite this assertion, little research has explored the potential mindfulness training might hold in improving emotion regulation in children at risk of emotion dysregulation. The findings of the review presented as part of this thesis reveal that while there are elements of mindfulness-based interventions that can lead to improved emotion regulation such as the length and consistency of intervention, the diversity of interventions which yielded improvements in emotion regulation implies no “best practice” format has yet been developed. The diversity of populations included in the review further suggests within successful MBIs there may be room to tailor interventions to be better suited to specific population samples, such as those with mental health or neurodivergent diagnoses, and still reap positive emotion regulation effects. Chart analysis findings revealed that clinical syndrome scales completed by carers are not implicitly reflecting the mental health experiences or needs of Aboriginal children in care. In particular, internal symptom expressions such as depression and anxiety are underreported. Despite the significant proportion of children experiencing poor mental health, over half the sample were engaging and achieving satisfactory grades at school, while just less than half were failing or consistently not attending. Findings further revealed that contrary to past research, the type and number of maltreatment exposures do not negatively correlate with academic achievement. Finally, findings from a pilot study of a Virtual Reality program reveal positive improvement in state mindfulness and acceptance of the program in Aboriginal children in out-of-home care with complex mental health presentations. This thesis offers a jumping-off point for further research into an area with significant opportunity for impact, highlighting some of the considerations necessary for work within this sample, as well as tentative support for a novel intervention.

Emotion Regulation and Mindfulness in Aboriginal Out-of-Home-Care Children

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Emotion Regulation and Mindfulness in Aboriginal Out-of-Home-Care Children

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