Introduction:

This paper investigates whether mindfulness training can generate spillovers to socially relevant economic behavior, particularly in the domains of environmental protection and income distribution.

Methods:

We conduct a randomized controlled trial among university students, offering an eight-week online mindfulness course and measuring outcomes using incentivized behavioral tasks and policy preference surveys.

Results:

While the intervention successfully increases mindfulness, we find no robust evidence of causal effects on pro-environmental behavior, distribution choices, or related policy preferences, and only selective effects on the proposed mediating channels.

Discussion:

These findings suggest that mindfulness interventions, especially in scalable online formats and voluntary settings, may have limited potential to influence behavior and preferences in these domains.