The effectiveness of a universal school-based intervention on state wellbeing in Irish school children: An umbrella review and cluster randomised controlled trial

Background: Childhood is a critically important developmental time for mental health and wellbeing, with evidence that early intervention can have lifelong benefits. Aims: This thesis describes two studies. The first assessed the scale and quality of the evidence base for school-based Mindfulness Based Interventions (MBI). The second evaluated the effectiveness of the A Lust for Life (ALFL) multi-component wellbeing programme, of which mindfulness is a fundamental component. Methods: An umbrella review was carried on meta-analyses of MBIs of controlled trials, with 6 included reviews covering 110 primary studies (N participants = 28,910; M = 12 yrs). The cluster randomised controlled trial (RCT) on the ALFL programme involved 402 participants from fifth and sixth classes (M = 11 yrs) in 9 schools, with random assignment to intervention or waiting list control group. Results: Findings of the umbrella review indicated statistically significant improvements, with small effect sizes, for wellbeing (g = 0 .128), anxiety (g = 0.112) and mindfulness (g = 0.11); and no statistically significant effect for depression, with a very small effect size (g = 0.05). The RCT showed that participation in ALFL led to small improvements in state wellbeing when children used behavioural skills, including mindfulness skills, which they learnt on the ALFL programme (d = 0.18, p = .034), and an increase in their use of skills learnt on the programme to promote state wellbeing (d = 0.27, p = .001), but no significant improvements in measures of trait wellbeing, anxiety or depression. Conclusions: The findings show that universal school-based interventions can improve wellbeing for children, while effectiveness in terms of anxiety or depression is mixed, with a possible differentiation in effect between ‘state’ and ‘trait’ measures. Implications and recommendations are discussed.