Mind-Body Conditioning Course for University Dance Students

Physical injuries and mental health issues are common in collegiate dance students. Distinct from other college students and student athletes, collegiate dancers must manage required academic courses with regular rehearsals, technique classes, and evaluative performances. The need for adequate sleep, proper nutrition, and physical and mental recovery, often disregarded by dance students, can lead to increased physical injuries, as well as increased stress, burnout, and performance anxiety. While dance tradition is slowly shifting, a focus on perfection relative to body appearance and type, personality, and performance continues to be encouraged and emulated. This focus only serves to exacerbate mental health concerns such as eating disorders, body dissatisfaction, anxiety and depression, that are common in dancers. Mindfulness-based approaches, including breath practices, progressive relaxation, yoga, and meditation, have shown promise in managing the stress and anxiety of college students including student athletes and those who major in performing arts. These interventions can be implemented as a group class, integrated into course content, or as individual, brief practices available or reinforced through a smartphone app. The Department of Dance at The Ohio State University currently offers Dance 5175/2175, Yoga Theory and Practice, through which students become familiar with the benefits of yoga through a rigorous asana (postures) and pranayama (breathwork) training. This new course, Body-Mind Conditioning for Dancers, will include studio work in mind-body practices, as well as education in the research surrounding the efficacy of mindfulness based interventions for conditioning dancers to their peak performance. Through a collaboration between The Ohio State University Center for Integrative Health and The Ohio State University Department of Dance, the purpose of this study is to evaluate the effects of integrating an evidence based, eight week mindfulness-based intervention into the OSU Dance 2802 curriculum on student perceived stress, burnout, resilience, physical pain and injury and assess the feasibility of integrating the mindfulness-based intervention into the Dance 2802, Introductory Dance Seminar for second year OSU Dance majors.