Modulation of the sensory and affective dimensions of pain by expectations and uncertainty: a Bayesian modeling approach
Arnaud Poublan-Couzardot, Giuseppe Pagnoni, Antoine Lutz
August 2, 2022 preprint DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/nteg7 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Experimental study |
|---|---|
| Sample size | 54 |
| Population | Healthy subjects with experience in meditation practice |
| Topics | Meditation |
| Keywords | Perception Cognition Cognitive psychology Trait Bayesian probability Bayesian inference Sensory system Stimulus psychology Pain catastrophizing Chronic pain Artificial intelligence |
| Citations | 10 |
| Key findings | Lifetime meditation practice was strongly and inversely correlated with the weight of short-term expectations in the perceptual process and with a trait-like prior influencing the affective dimension of pain. |
Abstract
The perception of pain is sensitive to various mental processes such as expectation about the nociceptive stimulus or individual differences in the affective and cognitive evaluations of pain. A promising approach to the investigation of the neurocomputational principles of pain perception is the theory of predictive processing which offers a general framework to understand perception and cognition. Rethinking the brain as a Bayesian inference organ, this theory has been recently applied to the experience of pain and its modulation with convincing results. We adapted an existing pain cueing paradigm to collect pain intensity and unpleasantness ratings from fifty-four healthy subjects with experience in meditation practice, while manipulating expectations and uncertainty about impending electrical stimulations. Using state-of-the-art statistical modeling, we modeled the generation of trial-wise pain ratings as a Bayesian inference process integrating probability distributions over sensory information, cue-based expectations and a trait-like, individual prior about pain experience. Notably, we extended previous hierarchical Bayesian models of pain by accounting for both the sensory and the affective components of pain. As predicted, individual psychological scores of pain catastrophizing and cognitive defusion showed opposite correlation patterns with the model parameters representing their computational counterparts. Furthermore, lifetime meditation practice was strongly and inversely correlated with the weight of short-term expectations in the perceptual process, as well as with a trait-like prior influencing the affective dimension of pain. We conclude that this approach offers a promising avenue for a principled investigation of pain perception mechanisms and, more specifically, of the effect of contemplative practices on the latter.
Comparable studies
Other experimental studies on meditation, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| The benefits of being present: Mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being. Cancer patients (clinical intervention study) | 2003 | Mixed methods: scale development, correlational, quasi-experimental, laboratory, experience-sampling, and clinical intervention study | |
| Loving-kindness meditation increases social connectedness. | 2008 | Controlled laboratory experiment | |
| Mindfulness and mind-wandering: Finding convergence through opposing constructs. | 2012 | Two studies: correlational study and experimental study | |
| Mental Training Enhances Attentional Stability: Neural and Behavioral Evidence | 2009 | Experimental study | |
| Mindfulness meditation and substance use in an incarcerated population. Incarcerated population | 2006 | Quasi-experimental with treatment-as-usual control condition |