The efficacy of mindfulness-based interventions and cognitive rehabilitation on emotional and executive functioning problems after acquired brain injury

This thesis portfolio aimed to assess the effectiveness of interventions on emotional and executive functioning difficulties after brain injury; both of which can be debilitating to an individual’s everyday life. The aim was to systematically review mindfulness-based literature used within the brain injury population to ascertain its effectiveness on emotional difficulties, especially anxiety and depression. Along with a meta-analytic review to assess the effectiveness of cognitive rehabilitation on executive functioning difficulties after brain injury. Databases were searched, and risk of bias and methodological quality was rated for all included papers. After inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied, 11 individual papers and five reviews were included in the systematic review, and 26 in the meta-analysis. Overall findings from the systematic review suggest that there is insufficient methodologically robust evidence from the reviewed studies to make confident conclusions about the effectiveness of mindfulness-based interventions reducing anxiety and/or depression symptoms after brain injury. Findings from the meta-analysis show small significant effect sizes across the majority of analyses which is suggestive of the heterogenous nature of brain injury literature. Methodological quality also varied across studies reviewed. Taking the findings from both reviews, whilst further methodologically robust research in both areas may be argued, the variation between participants and the interventions presented in both papers will create difficulty in concluding effectiveness confidently