Delinquency differences in daily emotional reactivity to mindfulness lapses

Delinquency is often associated with negative effects on well-being, and lapses in mindfulness are also associated with poorer well-being. The purpose of the current study is to examine how individual differences in delinquency are associated with emotional reactivity (i.e., within-person association between daily fluctuations in mindfulness and daily fluctuations in negative affect). Data were drawn from the Mindfulness and Anticipatory Coping Everyday study (MACE; Neupert & Bellingtier, 2019) where 107 undergraduate participants (aged 18–36) completed a 9-day daily diary study. On Day 1, participants reported baseline sociodemographic variables which included measures of self-reported delinquent behavior and peer delinquency. On Days 2–9, daily mindfulness lapses and negative affect were reported. Consistent with previous studies, higher levels of delinquency and decreases in daily mindfulness were each associated with higher negative affect. However, the current study extends past work with results from multilevel models showing that those who reported low peer delinquency were more emotionally reactive to mindfulness lapses than those who reported high peer delinquency. The same pattern was observed for self-reported delinquency; those who reported low personal delinquency were more emotionally reactive to mindfulness lapses than those who reported high personal delinquency. Fluctuations in mindfulness depend on individual differences in delinquency suggesting that both need to be considered simultaneously to understand emerging adults’ daily emotional well-being. The implications of these findings could indicate that efforts to boost mindfulness in emerging adults may be especially beneficial for the vast majority who are not involved in delinquent networks.