DOI: 10.5061/dryad.zpc866tfb
title: Brief mindfulness coaching enhances selective attention in medical scientists: A pilot study

description: Medical scientists have dual commitments to medicine and research that
 create hectic and stressful work schedules that can impact well-being as
 well as cognition. In this study, we evaluated whether mindfulness
 coaching alongside wearable-based lifestyle monitoring can benefit this
 population. We conducted a waitlist-controlled intervention study (n = 43)
 that included participation from pre-clinical students, graduate students,
 and medical scientist faculty. Quantitative outcomes assessments included
 subjective measures of burnout, mindfulness, self-compassion, and
 wellbeing, as well as objective cognitive assessments. Results showed no
 impacts on subjective measures (p &gt; 0.2). Yet, notably objective
 performance on attentive cognition was improved at post-intervention (p =
 0.003). Extent of improvement in selective attention was correlated with
 suppression of visual alpha oscillations – a neural marker for
 distractibility - measured using electroencephalography (EEG) (r = -0.32,
 p &lt; 0.05). Additionally, we obtained qualitative feedback from all
 participants after they had all received the intervention, including the
 waitlist arm. Thematic analysis of this feedback showed that participants
 in both groups equally rated the overall experience as very good (3.7 ±
 0.98 out 5), appreciated that the intervention paid attention to lifestyle
 factors, and contributed to mindfulness, compassion and sense of
 community. Majority (56.8%) of all participants reported that they expect
 to change their well-being related behaviors in the future as a result of
 the intervention. Overall, the study suggests utility of mindfulness
 coaching for improving attention skills in medical scientists, but that
 more needs to be done to enhance subjective well-being in this population.
description: Methods
 A total of 43
 physician-scientists participated in the study (mean age: 28.95 ± 4.36
 years, range: 23-43 years, 41.86% female). Most
 (76.7% ) participants were recruited
 from the dual-degree MSTP at the University of California San Diego
 (UCSD), and 23.3% had graduated an MD PhD program and were now
 physicians/junior faculty. Recruitment occurred directly through an
 in-person, annual retreat as well as over email. All participants provided
 written informed consent for study participation in accordance with the
 Declaration of Helsinki, and all experimental procedures were approved by
 the UCSD Institutional Review Board
  
 All data collection and
 intervention took place during Fall 2021 through Summer 2022. Participants
 provided demographic information at the beginning of the study. Of the
 total 43 participants, 22 were randomly assigned to the well-being
 intervention group and 21 were assigned to a waitlist control group. The
 sample size within each group was powered to detect medium effect size
 pre/post differences (Cohen’s d &gt;0.6), at beta power of 0.8 and
 alpha level of 0.05. Between-group differences met criteria for
 investigating only large effect size outcomes (Cohen’s d &gt;0.8) at
 beta power of 0.8 and alpha level of 0.05. Effect sizes were calculated a
 priori using the G*Power software (Faul et al.,
 2007).
  
 The well-being intervention
 group received the intervention during Fall-Winter quarter, while the
 waitlist group received no intervention during this time. The Waitlist
 control group eventually received the intervention during Spring-Summer
 quarter. All participants completed subjective and objective
 neuro-cognitive assessments before and after the first wave of the
 intervention, i.e., Fall-Winter quarter. At the end of Summer 2022, all
 participants in both groups also completed an experience feedback
 survey. Regarding missing data, there
 were no missing data for subjective assessments. Two participants in the
 waitlist control group were missing cognitive and neural data, while one
 participant in the well-being intervention group had corrupted neural data
 that could not be analyzed, hence, was missing. For the end of year
 qualitative survey, six participants had missing data (5 from the
 well-being intervention group and 1 from the waitlist-group).
  
description: # **Title of Dataset: Brief mindfulness coaching enhances selective
 attention in medical scientists: A pilot study** Brief summary of dataset
 contents, contextualized in experimental procedures and results.
 **Description of the Data and file structure** The xlsx file contains the
 study data corresponding to (1) Quantitative Outcomes Data and (2)
 Qualitative Thematic Analysis. Spreadsheet (1) - Quantitative Outcomes
 Data GroupID: A (Intervention) or B (Waitlist) SubjectIndex: Subject Study
 ID Age Bin: Subject age bin in years, bin 1 (age &lt;18), 2 (age 18-29), 3
 (age 30-39), 4 (age 40-49), 5 (age 50-59), 6 (age 60-69), 7 (age 70-79), 8
 (age 80-89), 9 (age &gt;90) Gender: Subject Gender, 1: male, 2: female, 3:
 other Ethnicity: Subject ethnicity, 1: Caucasian; 2: Black/African
 American; 3: Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander; 4: Asian; 5:
 Native American; 6: More than one ethnicity; 7: Other Pre-mbiexhaustion:
 Pre-Maslach Burnout Inventory exhaustion score of each participant
 Pre-mbiaccomplishment: Pre-Maslach Burnout Inventory accomplishment score
 of each participant Pre-mbidepersonalization: Pre-Maslach Burnout
 Inventory depersonalization score of each participant Pre-selfcompassion:
 Pre-selfcompassion score of each participant Pre-Mindfulnesscore:
 Pre-Mindfulness score of each participant Pre-Wellbeing: Pre-Wellbeing
 score of each participant Post-mbiexhaustion: Post-Maslach Burnout
 Inventory exhaustion score of each participant Post-mbiaccomplishment:
 Post-Maslach Burnout Inventory accomplishment score of each participant
 Post-mbidepersonalization: Post-Maslach Burnout Inventorydepersonalization
 score of each participant Post-selfcompassion: Post-selfcompassion score
 of each participant Post-Mindfulnesscore: Post-Mindfulnesscore score of
 each participant Post-Wellbeing: Post-Wellbeing score of each participant
 Pre_SA_Speed: Pre-Selective Attention Speed of each participant
 Post_SA_Speed: Post-Selective Attention Speed of each participant
 Pre_IP_Speed: Pre-Interference Processing Speed of each participant
 Post_IP_Speed: Post-Interference Processing Speed of each participant
 Pre_WM_Span: Pre-Working Memory Span of each participant Post_WM_Span:
 Post-Working Memory Span of each participant Pre_WM_Period: Pre-Working
 Memory Period of each participant Post_WM_Period: Post-Working Memory
 Period of each participant Pre_EB_Speed: Pre-Emotion Bias Speed of each
 participant Post_EB_Speed: Pre-Emotion Bias Speed of each participant
 Post-Pre_SA_Speed: Difference of Post-Pre Selective Attention Speed of
 each participant VisualAlpha_pre: VisualAlpha_pre source activity of each
 participant VisualAlpha_post: VisualAlpha_post source activity of each
 participant VisualAlpha_postpre: Difference of Post-Pre
 VisualAlpha_postpre source activity of each participant Note: The cells
 with values 'null' represent the missing data. Spreadsheet (2) -
 Experience Feedback Group IDs Sub IDs Overall Experience Rating (1:Poor,
 2: Fair, 3: Good, 4: Very Good, 5: Excellent) Expected Behavior Change (0:
 no, 1: yes) Attention to Lifestyle (Exercise/Sleep) Mindfulness Compassion
 Sense of Community Need for Structural Change #### Sharing/access
 Information Links to other publicly accessible locations of the data: N/A
 Was data derived from another source? No