Abstract

Achievement emotions significantly influence students’ well-being, learning quality, and academic performance. This study addresses the overlooked achievement emotions in nursing by investigating their relationship with mindfulness and academic performance, with an emphasis on the mediating effects of achievement emotions. This study employed a cross-sectional design involving 203 nursing students in a university in C province. Participants responded to a survey designed to assess their level of mindfulness, achievement emotions, and academic performance. Structural relationships among mindfulness, achievement emotions, and academic performance were tested using data-driven and computational analyses, including structural equation modeling (SEM) with Mplus 8. In addition, path analysis with bootstrapping was conducted to validate the hypothesized pathways and to examine the mediating effects of achievement emotions. Mindfulness was positively related to positive achievement emotions and negatively related to negative achievement emotions. While positive achievement emotions enhanced academic performance, negative achievement emotions had an adverse effect. However, mindfulness did not directly influence academic performance. Notably, achievement emotions served as a complete mediator in the association between mindfulness and academic performance. The results suggest that mindfulness benefits nursing students’ academic performance by amplifying positive achievement emotions and diminishing negative ones. The mediation effect highlights the importance of achievement emotions in nursing education, highlighting the necessity of educational programs that enhance students’ emotional experiences. These findings can serve as a crucial foundation for designing initiatives fostering mindfulness, achievement emotions, and effective learning among nursing students.