Let B X be a bounded symmetric domain realized as the unit ball of an ndimensional JB *-triple X = (C n , • X). In this paper, we give a new definition of Bloch type mappings on B X and give distortion theorems for Bloch type mappings on B X. When B X is the Euclidean unit ball in C n , this new definition coincides with that given by Chen and Kalaj or by the author. As a corollary of the distortion theorem, we obtain the lower estimate for the radius of the largest schlicht ball in the image of f centered at f (0) for α-Bloch mappings f on B X. Next, as another corollary of the distortion theorem, we show the Lipschitz continuity of (det B(z, z)) 1/2n | det Df (z)| 1/n for Bloch type mappings f on B X with respect to the Kobayashi metric, where B(z, z) is the Bergman operator on X, and use it to give a sufficient condition for the composition operator C ϕ to be bounded from below on the Bloch type space on B X , where ϕ is a holomorphic self mapping of B X. In the case B X = B n , we also give a necessary condition for C ϕ to be bounded from below which is a converse to the above result. Finally, as another application of the Lipschitz continuity, we obtain a result related to the interpolating sequences for the Bloch type space on B X .