Mindfulness-based programmes and 'bigger than self' issues: protocol for a scoping review

Mindfulness-based programmes (MBPs) have an established, growing evidence base as interventions to optimise health, well-being and performance of individual participants. Emerging evidence suggests that MBPs also enhance prosociality, encouraging individuals to contribute to positive social change. This study focuses on the potential of MBPs to facilitate development of participants' inner resources that support prosocial shifts. The review seeks to detect shifts in MBP benefit from individual toward 'bigger than self', informing and empowering individual and collective responses to complex societal and global issues. The review aims to map current literature on MBPs and social change, into a descriptive overview with commentary on quality, trends, theoretical models and gaps, and on how training in MBPs potentially enables individual and collective responses to societal and global issues. Recommendations for future directions for researchers seeking to advance this evidence base, and practitioners developing innovative MBPs for this purpose will be provided.

A scoping review of peer-reviewed literature will be undertaken and reported on according to the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews guidance. Systematic searches of four scientific databases will be undertaken to identify potentially eligible articles published from all time to current date. Data will be extracted using an extraction template and analysed descriptively using narrative synthesis.

This scoping review involves no human participants, so ethics is not required. Findings will be shared through professional networks, conference presentations and journal publication.