Acta Psychologica
July 1, 2019
P A Hancock, A D Kaplan, J K Cruit et al.
40 citations
An altered sense of time is one of nine dimensions characterizing the flow state. A meta-analysis of 63 studies (1,094 effect sizes) found moderately positive correlations between affective aspects of flow and time perception (r = 0.4), consciousness aspects (r = 0.21), and performance-based aspects (r = 0.17), supporting the original conceptualization of their role in generating and maintaining flow. Variations in physical and social environmental conditions had differential effects on the overall level of experienced flow. The results inform further model development to quantify and predict temporal perception as a metric of flow.
Acta Psychologica
November 1, 2023
Bence Szaszkó, Rebecca Rosa Schmid, Ulrich Pomper et al.
20 citations
An eight-week Hatha Yoga program for healthy yoga novices aged 18 to 40 reduced self-reported stress and stress reactivity and increased mindfulness, compared to a waitlist control group. However, the intervention did not significantly change state or trait anxiety, nor did it improve participants' ability to suppress distractions. The stress reductions were not explained by changes in distractor suppression, which remained unaffected. The findings suggest that regular Hatha Yoga practice can improve certain mental health outcomes without directly altering cognitive functions related to distraction suppression.
Acta Psychologica
November 1, 2024
Xiaofan Yan, Xiaojie Wang, Yanli Chen et al.
11 citations
Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) training improved psychological resilience, posttraumatic growth, life satisfaction, and mindful attention awareness, and reduced depression, anxiety, and PTSD intrusive symptoms among medical students at a military college. A total of 372 students completed questionnaires before, after, and one month following the intervention; a control group did not receive MBSR. The MBSR group showed significant improvements not seen in controls, and most gains were partly maintained one month later. The findings suggest MBSR can benefit mental health in this high-stress population.
Acta Psychologica
October 1, 2023
Anna F Leyland, Myrthe G. B. M. Boekhorst, Julia E Offermans et al.
5 citations
Trait mindfulness, particularly the non-judging facet, protects against anxiety and pregnancy-specific distress during pregnancy and after childbirth. In a longitudinal study of pregnant women assessed at 12, 22, and 32 weeks gestation and 6 weeks postpartum, mindfulness facets measured at 22 weeks were negatively linked to general anxiety at all later time points and to pregnancy-specific distress at 22 and 32 weeks. Non-judging showed the largest protective effect, surpassing partner involvement and other known risk factors. Mindfulness training emphasizing attitudinal aspects may benefit pregnant women at risk for high anxiety.
Acta Psychologica
April 1, 2026
Xianhua Zhang, Enqin Yan
2 citations
Mindfulness is positively linked to professional identity among early childhood education teachers, both directly and indirectly through psychological resilience and well-being. A survey of 854 full-time kindergarten teachers in Shandong Province, China, found that mindfulness directly predicted professional identity (β = 0.15). Psychological resilience mediated 55.5% of the total indirect effect, and well-being mediated 22.6%. A sequential pathway through resilience then well-being also contributed. The findings suggest that mindfulness enhances professional identity by boosting resilience and well-being, supporting the integration of mindfulness-based interventions in teacher training to improve emotion regulation and sustainable professional development.
Acta Psychologica
May 1, 2025
Fengbo Liu, Qingyang Yu, Shichang Cai et al.
2 citations
Brief mindfulness training improved athletes' mindfulness and reduced negative mood and burnout. In a randomized experiment, 60 athletes were assigned to either a mindfulness training group or a control group. After training, the mindfulness group showed significantly higher mindfulness scores and significantly lower burnout and mood disturbance scores compared to the control group. A moderation analysis indicated that the effect of mindfulness training on mood depended on athletes' initial burnout level, suggesting that athletes with higher burnout may benefit more from the intervention.
Acta Psychologica
June 20, 2025
Ivaylo Borislavov Iotchev, Hein Thomas van Schie
1 citation
The equivalence hypothesis claims that conscious and unconscious perception rely on the same brain areas. This paper argues that interpretation is incompatible with the biased competition model, where different interpretations of reality compete and one must be suppressed. In that framework, a representation is defined not only by active information but also by suppressed information. Currently, there is no evidence that primes can suppress alternative interpretations. Biased competition explains why primes often merely bias the agent rather than becoming real targets for behavior. The theoretical proposal awaits further empirical investigation.
Acta Psychologica
May 1, 2025
Philippine Chachignon, Emmanuelle Le Barbenchon, Lionel Dany et al.
1 citation
People without mental health conditions tend to see themselves as having a more complex and positive personality than others, combining opposing positive traits. In contrast, individuals with depression see themselves as more complex in negative traits, lacking self-enhancing strategies linked to psychological health. In a study of 24 participants with depression and anxiety disorders who completed an 8-week mindfulness-based intervention, measures of trait mindfulness, anxiety, depression, and self-compassion all improved. Participants showed reduced self-negativity and a more positive view of others, though they still viewed themselves more negatively than others. The multifaceted self concept offers a useful approach for assessing mental health changes in mindfulness interventions.
Acta Psychologica
March 1, 2026
Michael Kimmel
Expert performance in real-world settings involves fluidly blending multiple types of competencies. A review of skill theories in the motor domain reveals that cognitivist approaches emphasize conceptual and knowledge-based control, while 4E cognition theories stress sensorimotor coupling; both are too limited alone but complementary. Different mechanisms—such as sensorimotor cognition, body reflexivity, action imagery, strategic control, and declarative knowledge—become dynamically entangled in skilled behavior. To study this interfacing, high-grainsize qualitative process analysis ('coalescence analysis') is needed. The author argues against attempts to assimilate higher cognition into sensorimotor frameworks, instead endorsing a view of functional integration where higher cognition is treated on its own terms yet dynamically embedded in embodied couplings.
Acta Psychologica
July 1, 2026
Terje Sparby, Torbjørn Eftestøl, Markus Lindholm et al.
A recent taxonomy of philosophies of mind classifies Rudolf Steiner's view as mind-body dualism, but this classification is incorrect. Steiner's view is trinitarian, representing a unification of monism and dualism. This trinitarian conception challenges the taxonomy's placement of Steiner and suggests a potential fundamental limitation of the whole taxonomy, as monism and dualism may not be exclusive. Other thinkers such as Whitehead and de Chardin may also be trinitarian, indicating the taxonomy needs revision. The dualism versus monism debate mirrors limitations in current thinking. The trinitarian view offers a different approach to the hard problem of consciousness, understanding mind-body differentiation as part of human development.
Acta Psychologica
June 20, 2026
Paula Celeste Salamone, Nadia Alejandra Dowzuk, Martina Nayla Gallo et al.
People who experience depersonalization symptoms—feelings of detachment from oneself—report less comfort with social touch and seek it less, which in turn is linked to a less clear sense of self. In a survey of 273 non-clinical Argentinian adults, touch acceptance increased with relational closeness, and both comfort with social touch and acceptance of touch from intimate partners were positively associated with self-concept clarity. Depersonalization symptoms were also associated with higher anxiety, depression, and negative affect, and lower positive affect and life satisfaction. The findings suggest that social touch may be relevant for interventions targeting depersonalization.
Acta Psychologica
June 1, 2026
Gabriela Górska, Paweł Holas
Empathy and compassion can be blocked when suffering is perceived in out-group members. A brief, 10-minute mindfulness intervention focused on breathing body sensations was tested against an active control in 83 participants who watched videos of suffering. The intervention did not significantly increase empathic distress or compassion overall, but participants reported significantly higher empathic distress and compassion toward out-group members. The ability to focus on breathing mediated the intervention's effects on ratings of compassion, relief, and distress. These preliminary findings suggest attentional processes may be a mechanism through which brief mindfulness practices influence social and affective responses.
Acta Psychologica
June 1, 2026
Aanchal Sankhla, Samridhi Pareek, Gagan Jain
Mindfulness meditation may improve how accurately people remember how long an event lasted. In a small exploratory study, 30 participants—half experienced meditators and half non-meditators—completed an 11-minute session of Naad Brahma meditation (meditators) or listened to an audio story (controls). Meditators estimated the retrospective duration more accurately than non-meditators, but this finding is preliminary and not evidence of a causal effect. No differences were found between groups in prospective time perception or subjective passage of time. Meditators reported being significantly happier than non-meditators, with no other emotional differences. The results tentatively suggest meditation may refine memory-based time judgments.
Acta Psychologica
May 14, 2026
Aamer Aldbyani
A positive psychology course that included drawing-breathing meditation boosted mindfulness and digital detoxification and reduced smartphone addiction among nursing students at Shandong Xiehe University, China. In a quasi-experimental design with 33 students in each group, the experimental group showed significant improvements on measures of mindfulness, smartphone addiction, and digital detoxification over three time points, while the control group showed no changes. The findings suggest that combining mindfulness meditation with positive psychology instruction can help address technology-related behavioral issues in university students.
Acta Psychologica
May 1, 2026
Cristina Martinez Montes, Birgit Penzenstadler
A breathwork intervention positively impacts the well-being of knowledge workers, who face high stress from deadlines, overcommitment, isolation, sleep deprivation, and decision-making pressure. Through 43 semi-structured interviews analyzed via Constructive Grounded Theory, the study proposes the Breathe-well Grounded Theory, which identifies key concepts, principles, elements, dimensions, and interconnections shaping knowledge workers' lives and work experiences. The results are discussed in relation to general well-being theories. The authors offer theoretical, research, and practical implications to help knowledge workers improve their general well-being.
Acta Psychologica
February 13, 2026
Hina Kawaguchi, Vincent Taschereau-Dumouchel, Hakwan Lau et al.
People with aphantasia, who report no visual mental imagery, show the same gaze patterns as controls when reading imagery-rich stories. Both groups fixated longer on words and phrases describing sensory-rich perceptual imagery. Despite these identical eye movements, aphantasics reported feeling less immersed in the stories. Among controls, longer fixation on perceptual imagery correlated with stronger self-reported mental imagery, but this relationship was absent or reversed in aphantasics. The findings tentatively suggest that imagery may occur nonconsciously in aphantasia, with the condition primarily impairing introspective access to mental images rather than eliminating imagery itself.
Acta Psychologica
November 1, 2025
Mai Sakuragi, Satoshi Umeda
For people who accurately sense their own heartbeat, self-related thoughts tend to persist when their heart rate is accelerating. Additionally, individuals with higher depressive tendencies and accurate heartbeat perception are more likely to shift from task-focused to self-related thoughts when their heart rate decreases. These results indicate that interoception—the ability to detect internal bodily signals—can influence the flow of spontaneous thought by making certain thoughts more salient based on concurrent physiological changes.
Acta Psychologica
September 1, 2025
Eunha Kim, Teemu H Laine, Youbin Lee
In a randomized experiment with 60 college students, cognitive restructuring and mindfulness-based meditation did not significantly reduce stress or anxiety compared to a control condition after a social VR-based Trier Social Stress Test. However, trait anxiety moderated the effects: individuals with high trait anxiety experienced greater reductions in stress and anxiety from both interventions than those with low trait anxiety. The findings suggest these interventions may be particularly beneficial for people with high trait anxiety, while their effectiveness for low trait anxiety may be limited. The results also highlight social VR as a tool for studying and managing stress in controlled environments.
Acta Psychologica
June 1, 2024
Shi-Yang Zhong, Jia-Hui Guo, Xiao-Na Zhou et al.
A 4-week brief mindfulness meditation training program improved dispositional mindfulness and some attention functions in young men aged 18 to 26 from the security industry, but did not affect alertness or orientation networks or reduce cortisol levels. The training enhanced scores on the Five Facets Mindfulness Questionnaire and showed marginally significant improvements in the executive control network, as well as better attention allocation to light stimulation and prolonged individual attention. No effect was found on alertness or orientation networks, and cortisol concentration did not decrease.
Acta Psychologica
May 1, 2024
Raghavendra Sode, Kalaa Chenji
Self-transcendence and spiritual transcendence are positively linked to innovative work behavior, with workplace spirituality playing a mediating role. Workplace spirituality partially mediates the relationship between self-transcendence and innovative work behavior, and fully mediates the connection between spiritual transcendence and innovative work behavior. These findings highlight the importance of fostering spirituality in the workplace to encourage employee innovation.
Acta Psychologica
April 1, 2024
Chao Lian, Xiao-Xia Chen
Self-transcendence—a value that goes beyond self-interest—predicts green consumption through several psychological pathways. In a nationally representative sample of 428 Chinese adults, self-transcendence influenced green consumption indirectly via four routes: nature connectedness alone, social connectedness alone, and two chain paths where construction of meaning in life first boosted either nature connectedness or social connectedness. Nature connectedness was the strongest mediator, accounting for the largest share of the indirect effect. The findings clarify how self-transcendence translates into sustainable consumer behavior and offer practical guidance for promoting eco-friendly lifestyles.
Acta Psychologica
March 1, 2024
Abbie J Irving, Niia Nikolova, Susan Robinson et al.
Transliminality—a personality trait encompassing magical ideation, mystical experience, fantasy proneness, absorption, and heightened sensitivity—shows only weak associations with how people respond to hypnotic and imaginative suggestions. In a study that avoided context effects by measuring personality traits and suggestibility in separate sessions, correlations between transliminality and various suggestibility measures ranged from 0.19 to 0.24. Multiple regression analyses found that transliminality was not a strong predictor of suggestibility beyond other personality measures. The findings indicate that while transliminality is related to suggestibility, the relationship is modest.