Evaluation of Academic Dissertations via Mindfulness in Children Using Content Analysis Method

Abstract

Mindfulness, which means being aware of the moment and what is happening around and accepting it unconditionally, is especially valuable for children who are in the age of discovery and development. Research question: In the recent years Council of Higher Education (CoHE) Thesis Center publications, how has the mindfulness been studied in Turkish children? Searches were conducted of CoHE Thesis Center until October 2023 to identify dissertations (master of science, doctorate, specialization in medicine). Using the keywords “mindfulness” and “child”, “mindfulness” and “children” were scanned. Studies which did not have full text access and did not include assessment and intervention on mindfulness with children were excluded. Eighty-nine dissertations met the study’s inclusion criteria. Once duplicates were removed and were screened for eligibility, totally 27 studies between 2018 and September 2023 were reviewed. Types of these studies were as follows: 22 were master of science, 3 were doctorate and 2 were specialization in medicine. The most common field outcomes were psychology and education and training. Within the scope of this determination, there were two main themes: evaluation methods (n=20) and intervention methods (n=7). While there were 10 studies between 2017 and 2019, 17 studies were found in the last four years. It has been observed that postgraduate dissertations on mindfulness have increased in recent years. Although the researchers on the subject appear to be from different scientific fields and disciplines and that interest in the subject has increased, future studies are needed to create a general consensus.

Keywords

• academic dissertations
• theses
• mindfulness
• child