Meditating roles of empathy, quiet ego and emotional intelligence in the relationship between therapist mindfulness and cultural humility

No research has explored the association of cultural humility with mindfulness, empathy, quiet ego, and emotional intelligence among psychotherapists. Furthermore, the mediating roles of empathy, quiet ego, and emotional intelligence in the relationship between mindfulness and cultural humility have not been investigated. This study aimed to address these gaps. The sample of this study consisted of 205 psychotherapists who are currently providing therapy. To measure the constructs, Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire - Short Form, Cultural Humility Scale, Basic Empathy Scale, Quiet Ego Scale, and Emotional Intelligence Scale were used. To test the hypotheses, mediation analysis was conducted. The findings revealed that cultural humility was positively associated with all constructs. However, mindfulness was not associated with empathy as hypothesized. Therefore, the components of empathy (cognitive and affective empathy) were examined. It was found that the mindfulness and cultural humility had a positive relationship only with cognitive empathy. Consequently, the mediation analysis was conducted using the components of empathy rather than the entire scale. The results revealed that cognitive empathy, quiet ego, and emotional intelligence fully mediated the relationship between mindfulness and cultural humility. The interpretation of the findings was discussed within the scope of the literature.