Frontiers in Psychology
January 1, 2014
Viviana Capurso, Franco Fabbro, Cristiano Crescentini
115 citations
A commentary argues that the relationship between mindfulness meditation and creativity is more complex than previously assumed. It suggests that while mindfulness reduces mind-wandering, which is often linked to creative insight, it may also enhance certain cognitive processes that support creativity. The author contends that the effects depend on the type of mindfulness practice and the aspect of creativity being measured, and calls for more nuanced research to disentangle these interactions.
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
September 22, 2020
Ornella Santonastaso, Vittoria Zaccari, Cristiano Crescentini et al.
43 citations
A preliminary trial compared mindfulness-oriented meditation (MOM) training with an active control condition (Emotion Education Program, EEP) in 25 children aged 7–11 years with ADHD. MOM training, administered three times per week for eight weeks, led to significant improvements in all neuropsychological outcome measures and in ADHD symptoms, whereas the control condition did not. The authors suggest MOM training is a promising complementary or alternative intervention for ameliorating cognitive and clinical manifestations of ADHD.
Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland)
November 18, 2024
Alessandro Lazzarelli, Francesca Scafuto, Cristiano Crescentini et al.
30 citations
Interoceptive ability—detecting and interpreting body signals—can be trained through mind-body interventions and is central to emotion regulation. Mindfulness meditation improves both interoceptive ability and emotion regulation via top-down brain-body processing. Interventions using bottom-up processing through body movement and emotional expression remain under-investigated. The authors argue that interoceptive ability is a crucial aspect linking mind-body interventions to emotion regulation and suggest that studying it with both quantitative and qualitative methods could integrate top-down and bottom-up emotion processing, observational and non-observational body awareness, and conscious and unconscious levels of interoception.
Front Hum Neurosci
January 22, 2025
Sara Sorella, Cristiano Crescentini, Alessio Matiz et al.
8 citations
Greater moment-to-moment fluctuation in brain activity within the default mode network during rest predicts more frequent spontaneous mind wandering. People who report higher mindfulness skills tend to experience less spontaneous mind wandering. The findings suggest a link between the brain's resting-state dynamics and the tendency for the mind to wander, and indicate that mindfulness may relate to reduced variability in this brain network.
Frontiers in Psychology
January 1, 2025
Alberto Chiesa, Cristiano Crescentini, Fabio D'Antoni et al.
5 citations
A nine-month mindfulness teacher training program enhanced the ability to perceive and interpret bodily signals—known as interoceptive awareness—in 38 individuals training to become mindfulness-based intervention teachers, compared with 24 matched controls. The trained group showed significantly greater increases in awareness of mind-body integration. Although overall emotional distress did not differ between groups, increases in self-regulation scores within the training group were linked to decreases in depression and total emotional distress. The findings suggest that mindfulness training for future teachers further improves their capacity to attend to, regulate, and interpret bodily signals.
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
November 13, 2024
Rebecca Ciacchini, Ciro Conversano, Graziella Orrù et al.
5 citations
A mindfulness-based stress reduction program for people with chronic pain (fibromyalgia or low back pain) improved sleep quality and showed a marginal increase in trait mindfulness. The intervention reduced perceived stress differently between the two diagnostic groups, and it also reduced anxiety in those with fibromyalgia and depressive symptoms in those with low back pain. These results suggest that mindfulness-based approaches could be tailored for personalized pain management.
Psychology Research and Behavior Management
January 1, 2024
Alessio Matiz, Franco Fabbro, Cristiano Crescentini
4 citations
A storytelling-based mindfulness program for children in grades 3 to 5 showed moderate acceptability, with an average rating of 2.9 out of 4. Children with higher persistence, cooperativeness, and self-transcendence traits liked the program more, found it useful, and engaged more. Over half (57.8%) used mindfulness practices in daily life, and 93.9% would recommend it. Children reported learning about emotional and physical difficulties, calm and relaxation, resilience, self-exploration, and attention. Acceptability was higher than similar programs, and certain personality traits may help tailor such interventions for better outcomes.
Mindfulness
April 23, 2025
Alessio Matiz, Stefania Pascut, Franco Fabbro et al.
3 citations
An 8-week internet-based mindfulness training improved Italian school teachers' anxiety, interoceptive awareness, and professional efficacy compared to a control group. Anxiety reduction was medium-sized, interoceptive awareness improvements were medium-to-large, and professional efficacy gains were small-to-medium. The effects depended on teachers' baseline temperament and character: reduced anxiety occurred only for those with higher reward dependence or lower-to-middle self-directedness; improved interoceptive attention regulation occurred for those with middle-to-higher persistence; and improved efficacy for student engagement occurred only for those with lower self-transcendence. The study highlights the need to consider personality dimensions when designing mindfulness interventions for teachers.
Healthcare
March 6, 2026
Fabio D’Antoni, Fabio Mattiussi, Cristiano Crescentini
2 citations
Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs), particularly Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction and Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy, improve grief-related distress, depressive symptoms, and psychological well-being in bereaved individuals. These interventions reduce rumination and experiential avoidance while increasing self-compassion and emotion regulation. Evidence from 17 studies, however, remains preliminary due to small sample sizes, varied outcome measures, and limited long-term follow-up. MBIs appear promising as adjunctive support in bereavement care, targeting acceptance, decentering, and self-compassion. High-quality randomized controlled trials are needed to establish efficacy and clarify mechanisms.
Mindfulness
December 2, 2025
Samantha Galluzzi, Claudio Singh Solorzano, Moira Marizzoni et al.
2 citations
A systematic review of 22 controlled clinical trials found that mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) such as mindfulness-based stress reduction and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy positively affect physiological markers of stress in older adults. The interventions influenced five stress-related systems: brain circuits and signaling, the sympathetic-adrenomedullary axis, the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis, the immune system, and gene expression and epigenetic mediators. Effects on brain circuits were observed in both clinical and community populations. The authors suggest these findings support the influence of MBIs on pathophysiological pathways related to chronic stress at a system level, though they note limitations including outcome heterogeneity, small sample sizes, and risk of bias.
Mindfulness
October 16, 2023
Susanna Feruglio, M. S. Panasiti, Cristiano Crescentini et al.
An 8-week mindfulness meditation training reduced self-serving dishonest behavior in a card game where participants were tempted to lie for money. Trained participants deceived significantly less after training, while a waitlisted control group showed no change. Self-report measures showed increases in attention regulation, body awareness, emotion regulation, and non-reactivity to inner experience among trained participants. The amount of weekly meditation practice predicted moral behavior change, especially in those with the highest ability to regulate attention toward internal bodily signals. The results suggest that mindfulness meditation decreases dishonesty and heightens awareness of bodily and emotional states.
Behavioral Sciences
February 24, 2022
Susanna Feruglio, Stefania Pascut, Alessio Matiz et al.
Healthy Italian adolescents who completed eight weeks of either mindfulness-oriented meditation or autogenic training showed increased cooperativeness and reduced emotional symptoms. The more participants' cooperativeness rose, the more their emotional symptoms fell. Both mind-body interventions fostered a cooperative attitude and helped regulate emotions, suggesting they may protect youth well-being and psychosocial adjustment in school settings.
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
January 20, 2022
Fabio D’Antoni, Alessio Matiz, Franco Fabbro et al.
A single 40-minute session of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), Brainspotting (BSP), or Body Scan Meditation (BSM) each reduced the subjective disturbance (SUD scores) of distressing memories in 40 healthy adult psychologists and medical doctors. EMDR and BSP produced significantly lower disturbance than BSM and a book-reading control condition, both immediately after the session and at follow-up. BSM also lowered disturbance more than book reading. EMDR and BSP additionally shortened the time participants spent telling the memory. The study suggests that even one session of these interventions can help process distressing memories in a non-clinical sample.