The Relationship Among the Components of Self-compassion: A Pilot Study Using a Compassionate Writing Intervention to Enhance Self-kindness, Common Humanity, and Mindfulness

Abstract

Self-compassion has been theorized to have three components, each with a positive pole and a negative pole: self-kindness versus self-judgment, common humanity versus isolation, and mindfulness versus over-identification. Neff (Self Identity 2:85–101, 2003a) proposes that they mutually influence each other, however, this proposition has not been tested yet. We conducted a pilot study to see if improvements from training one component spilled over to the other two—and whether these trainings had an impact on well-being. 80 participants completed 8 weeks of self-compassionate writing exercises to enhance either self-kindness, common humanity, or mindfulness. Trait self-compassion was assessed using the six-factor model of the self-compassion scale. To address issues of alpha-error-inflation, the false discovery rate was fixed at 5%, and critical p values were adjusted accordingly. Participants in the mindfulness condition reported increased total self-compassion (p =.009), which was accompanied by increased self-kindness (p =.027) and lower isolation (p =.045). Participants in the common humanity condition reported improved total self-compassion (p =.018), lower over-identification (p =.045), and higher life-satisfaction (p =.049). The training in self-kindness failed to improve self-kindness or any other factor. These findings provide initial evidence that the components of self-compassion mutually enhance each other. They also emphasize the importance of mindfulness within the conceptualization of self-compassion.