Frontiers in Psychology
August 12, 2020
Patrizio Paoletti, Tal Dotan Ben-Soussan
47 citations
Focusing attention on silence can serve as a paradigm similar to sensory deprivation for studying consciousness without content. This hypothesis paper reviews influential models of consciousness and their views on the relationship between consciousness and its contents. After assessing strengths and weaknesses of current models, the authors propose an extension based on the Sphere Model of Consciousness (SMC), introducing new definitions for identification and self-awareness as states of consciousness. They compare Paoletti's theoretical model for self-development with other models, noting similarities and differences. The paper concludes by discussing how attentional focus on silence can be empirically tested.
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience
October 6, 2017
Joseph Glicksohn, Aviva Berkovich-Ohana, Federica Mauro et al.
38 citations
Exposure to a monotonous sensory environment can alter time perception and subjective experience. Participants spent 20 minutes in a whole-body altered sensory chamber with white and colored light, relaxing with eyes closed. Before entering, they completed a time-production task; one group repeated it inside the chamber, another after exiting. The main effect of the sensory environment was a change in the intercept of the psychophysical function when produced time was plotted against target duration on a log-log scale. For participants reporting a marked change in time experience, such as the sensation of time disappearing, their time-production data could not be linearized on a log-log plot, suggesting a possible break in the psychophysical function.
Frontiers in Psychology
January 1, 2020
Joseph Glicksohn, Tal Dotan Ben-Soussan
19 citations
A female participant who scored the maximum on the Absorption Scale reported a spiritual experience—feeling she was meeting God—while immersed in a whole-body perceptual deprivation tank. Her experience included imagery of a spaceship, corridors, a man in white, speaking to God, the sun, supernova, concentric images, and an out-of-body experience. Her EEG showed frontal and parietal left-greater-than-right alpha asymmetry at baseline, and during the tank condition, a global increase in alpha power with a sharp increase in right-frontal alpha power. Comparing her data with another high-absorption participant and two low-absorption participants suggests that verbalizable spiritual experiences may be linked to increased right-frontal alpha power, whereas ineffable mystical experiences might involve increased left-frontal alpha power.
IntechOpen eBooks
June 26, 2020
Patrizio Paoletti, Tal Dotan Ben-Soussan, Joseph Glicksohn
13 citations
Theta brainwave activity (4–7 Hz) is linked to hypnosis, hypnotic analgesia, meditation, and absorption, and also supports cognitive functions like spatial navigation, memory, creativity, and divided attention. This manuscript synthesizes current knowledge on theta's roles in hypnosis and their connections to movement, noting that movement paradigms such as Quadrato Motor Training modulate theta activity and improve cognition and emotional well-being. The authors discuss these movement paradigms as therapeutic tools related to hypnosis and highlight relationships between diagonal movement and psychological phenomena including intentionality, attention, and the Sphere Model of Consciousness.
Frontiers in Psychology
January 1, 2020
Tal Dotan Ben-Soussan, Fabio Marson, Claudia Piervincenzi et al.
12 citations
Silence-related experiences during meditation are linked to changes in brain structure and reduced attentional effort. In a study of Quadrato Motor Training (QMT), participants who reported increased silence-related experiences after six weeks of practice also showed decreased attentional effort and increased fractional anisotropy in the left uncinate fasciculus, a white-matter tract. The findings suggest that silence in meditation involves specific neuroanatomical changes and may reduce the cognitive effort required to maintain attention.
Front Psychol
April 13, 2021
Tal Dotan Ben-Soussan, Narayanan Srinivasan, Joseph Glicksohn et al.
8 citations
This editorial introduces a collection of research exploring the neurophysiology of silence from multiple perspectives, including neuroscience, psychology, education, and contemplative traditions. It argues that silence is not merely the absence of sound but an active state that can influence brain function, cognitive processes, and well-being. The editorial highlights how silence may promote mental clarity, stress reduction, and restorative states, with potential applications in learning and education. It sets the stage for examining how silence affects brain activity, cognitive benefits, and psychological health, suggesting that understanding these mechanisms could inform practices for enhancing mental clarity and knowledge acquisition.
Progress in Brain Research
January 1, 2023
Michele Pellegrino, Joseph Glicksohn, Fabio Marson et al.
3 citations
Immersion in the OVO Whole-Body Perceptual Deprivation chamber, a homogeneous sensory environment, consistently produces positively connotated, bodily-oriented, and cognitively dedifferentiated subjective states in most people. Semi-structured interviews with 32 participants, analyzed by three independent evaluators, showed significant consensus on experiences such as softened boundaries across time and sensory modalities. These subjective findings align with prior electrophysiological results that reported increased delta and beta activity in the left inferior frontal cortex and left insula during immersion.
Progress in Brain Research
January 1, 2024
Fabio Marson, Revital Naor-Ziv, Patrizio Paoletti et al.
Empathy, the ability to infer others' emotions, is linked to bodily sensations from the autonomic nervous system. A survey of 581 participants found that people who meditate score higher on empathy than non-meditators. Lower autonomic reactivity in organs above the diaphragm was associated with higher empathy. Among participants with high autonomic reactivity, empathy was positively linked to interoceptive components of abstract concepts. The results suggest that meditation and low autonomic reactivity relate to empathy, possibly by downregulating autonomic responses.
Progress in Brain Research
January 1, 2023
Loredana Verdone, Fabio Marson, Micaela Caserta et al.
A movement meditation called Quadrato Motor Training (QMT) reduced levels of the proinflammatory cytokine interleukin-1beta (IL-1β) and increased creativity in healthy adults. Thirty participants were divided into a QMT group that practiced for two months and a passive control group. Salivary IL-1β protein decreased and performance on the Alternate Uses Task, a measure of creativity, improved in the QMT group compared with controls. The findings suggest that non-pharmacological mind-body practices can reduce inflammation and support cognitive function.
Frontiers in Psychology
May 19, 2022
Patrizio Paoletti, Rotem Leshem, Michele Pellegrino et al.
A hypothesis paper proposes the Sphere Model of Consciousness (SMC) to examine consciousness and self-awareness, aiming to address methodological issues in consciousness research. It presents a preliminary attempt to validate the SMC using a simplified electrophysiological topographic map of the Self, showing a gradual shift from faster to slower frequency bands that mirrors dynamics between SMC states of Self. A mini-review of studies explores whether different SMC states of Self correspond to specific frequency bands, and the theoretical argument suggests the SMC's hierarchical organization of three states of Self mirrors the hierarchy of Focused Attention, Open Monitoring, and Non-Dual meditation types. Testable predictions and potential applications are offered.
Frontiers in Psychology
January 1, 2014
Tal Dotan Ben-Soussan, Aviva Berkovich-Ohana, Joseph Glicksohn et al.
Quadrato Motor Training (QMT), a structured walking meditation, improves spatial performance on the Hidden Figures Test (HFT) and affects brain connectivity differently in males and females. In a first study with 24 females, QMT led to greater improvement in HFT performance than verbal or simple motor training. A second study with 37 participants (20 males) found that after QMT, HFT performance improved in both genders, but EEG coherence changed in opposite directions: theta and alpha intra-hemispheric coherence increased in females and decreased in males. The findings suggest gender-dependent electrophysiological effects of QMT and highlight the need to study gender differences in contemplative neuroscience.