Mindfulness meditation and gene expression: a hypothesis-generating framework
Current Opinion in Psychology July 11, 2019 David S. Black, Georgia Christodoulou, S. Cole
Social stressors alter immune response gene expression through signal transduction, a process by which extracellular signals trigger intracellular changes. Mindfulness meditation, a practice for cultivating attention and self-regulation, may influence this process by modulating brain activity patterns related to attention, self-regulation, and threat evaluation. The article reviews controlled trials on mindfulness meditation and gene expression, then proposes a conceptual model grounded in social genomics theory. It hypothesizes that mindfulness meditation could alter the signal transduction that regulates immune response gene expression, suggesting a potential mind-body pathway for stress-related cellular changes.