[Mentalizing as Psychosocial Vaccination in Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy]. / Mentalisieren als psychosoziale Impfung in der Kinder- und Jugendlichenpsychotherapie.

Based on the psychological stress caused by theCovid 19 pandemic in families, this article explores the fundamental question of how the psychological process of mentalizing - metaphorically speaking - can act as a psychosocial vaccination in stressful times. To this end, we look at the developments in the psychosocial context under the conditions of the pandemic and consider the effects on child and adolescent psychotherapy on the basis of a vignette of a group therapy session.

Mentalizing as a Predictor of Well-Being and Emotion Regulation: Longitudinal Evidence from a Community Sample of Young Adults.

Background: In recent years, mentalizing - the capacity to understand one's own and others' intentional mental states in social contexts - has been considered to be a protective capacity that enables adaptive processing of stress-related emotional arousal, benefits general well-being and underpins adaptive emotion regulation. Objective: Several studies using cross-sectional research designs have demonstrated the potential health-promoting effect of mentalizing in non-clinical samples. However, longitudinal evidence is scarce. The present study aimed to investigate whether mentalizing predicts well-being and emotion regulation strategies in a non-clinical sample of mainly young adults using a prospective longitudinal design. Methods: In a prospective research design, 135 participants completed questionnaires assessing well-being, psychological symptom severity and mentalizing capacity at baseline (T1). Twelve months later (T2), emotion regulation strategies (suppression and cognitive reappraisal), well-being and psychological symptom severity were assessed by self-report. The data were analyzed using multivariate linear regression analysis. Results: Impairments in mentalizing were a significant negative predictor of well-being 12 months later. Furthermore, impairments in mentalizing positively predicted suppression of emotional states at T2. No association was found between deficits in mentalizing and cognitive reappraisal of emotional states over the course of 1 year. Conclusion: The findings indicate that mentalizing is longitudinally associated with mental health indicators in a non-clinical adult sample. Specifically, ineffective mentalizing was associated with impaired psychological well-being and a tendency to suppress intense emotional states over a period of 1 year. Future research should replicate these findings using multiple measurement timepoints to etablish causality.

Mentalizing partially mediates the association between attachment insecurity and global stress in preservice teachers.

Objective: Considering the fact that the teaching profession is a highly stressful occupation and that teachers' ineffective coping strategies contribute to higher levels of stress, the objective of the present study was to investigate whether insecure attachment is related to global stress experiences in preservice student teachers. Furthermore, it was examined whether this link is mediated by the preservice teachers' mentalizing-the capacity to perceive and consider one's own and others' behavior based on intentional mental states. Methods: Data of this cross-sectional study came from 202 preservice student teachers using self-report instruments (attachment: Expectation in Close Relationships; mentalizing: Reflective Functioning Questionnaire; stress: Trier Inventory of Chronic Stress). The hypotheses were tested using structural equation modelling. Results: Anxious attachment was positively related to stress and impairments in mentalizing. In addition, the link between attachment-related anxiety and stress was partially mediated by mentalizing. Avoidant attachment was not associated with stress or mentalizing. Discussion: Results indicate that anxious attachment is associated with higher perceived stress in preservice student teachers. Consequently, attachment-related anxiety may be a risk factor which, in turn, may foster perceptions of higher global stress experiences. Conclusion: Additional research needs to focus on exploring the link between attachment insecurity and global stress experiences among preservice student teachers. An examination of preservice student teachers' own attachment experiences proves to be useful, for example in the context of mentalization-based supervision or reflective practice.

Self-Rated Mentalizing Mediates the Relationship Between Stress and Coping in a Non-Clinical Sample.

BACKGROUND: The clinical concept of mentalizing has recently been extended into non-clinical contexts. In particular, the protective function of robust mentalizing as a processing capacity of interpersonal and intrapsychic events has become a focus of consideration. Theoretical approaches hypothesize that mentalizing may allow for an adequate self-awareness in the face of aversive experiences such as stress, leading to a reappraisal of these experiences and therefore enables the use of adaptive coping behaviors. OBJECTIVE: The study aimed to investigate the association between coping behavior, mentalizing and experiences of stress. METHOD: 534 healthy adults completed the German-language Stress Processing Questionnaire (SVF), the Mentalization Questionnaire (MZQ), and a short scale of the Trierer Inventory of Chronic Stress (TICS) in a cross-sectional research design. RESULTS: Correlational analyses suggested associations between coping and mentalizing. Furthermore, MZQ scores predicted both positive and negative coping behavior. The relationship between stress and both negative and positive coping was mediated by mentalizing capacity. CONCLUSION: Findings confirm the hypothesis that mentalizing may represent a coping resource within a resilience framework. An implementation of the concept in preventive mental health interventions is discussed.

Mentalizing mediates the association between emotional abuse in childhood and potential for aggression in non-clinical adults.

BACKGROUND: Emotional abuse in childhood has been linked to a higher expression of aggressive behavior in adulthood. The identification of protective factors that mitigate this association is needed. Mentalizing-the capacity to understand behavior in terms of intentional mental states-appears to be a promising candidate factor that possibly modifies maladaptive consequences of early emotional abuse. OBJECTIVE: This study investigated associations between the history of emotional abuse, aggressive behavior in adulthood and mentalizing capacities in a non-clinical sample of adults. METHODS: 214 healthy adults completed questionnaires measuring retrospectively rated experiences of emotional abuse in childhood, mentalizing capacities and aggressive behavior in a cross-sectional design. RESULTS: Results indicated associations between emotional abuse in childhood, uncertainty about mental states, and aggressive behavior in adulthood. Moreover, certainty about mental states counteracted the negative effect of emotional abuse and partially mediated the associations between emotional abuse and aggressive behavior in adulthood. CONCLUSION: This study extends current research and sheds further light on the relationship between emotional abuse in childhood, the health-promoting capacity of mentalizing, and aggressive behavior in non-clinical adults.