Self-compassion in Irish social work students: Relationships between resilience, engagement and motivation

Self-compassion recognises a meaning of life's suffering, aligning with existential positive psy-chology. Although this construct is known to protect our mental health, how to augment self-compassion remains to be evaluated. Social work students suffer from high rates of mental health problems, however research into self-compassion in this population remains to be devel-oped. This study aimed to evaluate i) relationships between self-compassion and more tradition-al positive constructs—resilience, engagement and motivation, and ii) differences of these con-structs between the levels of studies, to inform how self-compassion can be enhanced in social work students. One hundred twenty-nine Irish social work students completed self-report scales regarding self-compassion, resilience, engagement and motivation. Correlation, regression, and one-way MANOVA were conducted. Self-compassion was associated with gender, age, resili-ence, engagement and intrinsic motivation. Resilience and intrinsic motivation were significant predictors of self-compassion. There was no significant difference in the levels of these constructs between the levels of studies. Findings suggest that social work educators across different levels can strengthen students’ resilience and intrinsic motivation to cultivate the students' self-compassion. Moreover, the close relationships between self-compassion, resilience and in-trinsic motivation indicate that orienting students to a meaning of the studies helps their mental health.N/