Differential efficacy of physical exercise and mindfulness during lunch breaks as internal work recovery strategies: a daily study

ABSTRACTThis study aims to identify whether daily activities during the lunch break, performed before eating, are associated with improvements in several indicators related to recovery from work stress. No existing studies examine the daily effects of sitting mindfulness meditation and aerobic physical exercise practiced during lunch break as daily internal work recovery activities. This three-armed randomized controlled trial was carried out over 22 working days with service sector workers (n = 94, age mean, 46.8) The RCT was registered in ClinicalTrials.gov, Identifier: NCT03728062. The mindfulness group received a mindfulness-based intervention (sitting meditation), while the physical exercise group practiced an aerobic exercise program with the same time intervals as the mindfulness group (15–30 minutes); the third group was the control group. We measured daily effects on fatigue, psychological detachment, sleep quality, stress symptoms, and attention problems. Measurements of daily variables were collected through an ad hoc App. Growth curve analysis reveals that mindfulness and physical exercise can effectively reduce fatigue, stress boschphysicalBosch physical exercise significantly improved sleep quality.KEYWORDS: Mindfulnessstressphysical exercisework recoverydaily study Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Data availability statementThe data supporting the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.Supplementary materialSupplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/1359432X.2023.2198706.Additional informationFundingThe study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee at Universidad Rey Juan Carlos (No. 0709201711717) and registered in ClinicalTrials.gov, Identifier: NCT03728062 (https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03728062).