Event-related delta, theta, alpha and gamma correlates to auditory oddball processing during Vipassana meditation.
B Rael Cahn, Arnaud Delorme, John Polich
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience May 29, 2012 DOI: 10.1093/scan/nss060 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Within-subject experimental EEG study Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Population | Long-term Vipassana meditators |
| Intervention | Vipassana meditation |
| Duration | 25 min meditation or control periods, with a 4 min auditory oddball task at the end of each |
| Topics | Meditation |
| Keywords | Humans Acoustic stimulation Analysis of variance Awareness Auditory perception Attention Evoked potentials Middle aged Female Young adult Brain waves Functional neuroimaging Discrimination, psychological |
| Key findings | During meditation compared with instructed mind wandering, meditators showed reduced evoked delta power to distracters and greater late alpha-1 reduction, suggesting altered attentional engagement. Standard stimuli elicited increased early alpha and theta phase synchrony, indicating enhanced processing of habituated background stimuli. Greater differential early gamma power across stimulus classes during meditation was driven by increased distracter-evoked gamma power and phase synchrony in longer-term practitioners, which the authors interpret as enhanced perceptual clarity and decreased automated reactivity. |
Abstract
Long-term Vipassana meditators sat in meditation vs. a control (instructed mind wandering) states for 25 min, electroencephalography (EEG) was recorded and condition order counterbalanced. For the last 4 min, a three-stimulus auditory oddball series was presented during both meditation and control periods through headphones and no task imposed. Time-frequency analysis demonstrated that meditation relative to the control condition evinced decreased evoked delta (2-4 Hz) power to distracter stimuli concomitantly with a greater event-related reduction of late (500-900 ms) alpha-1 (8-10 Hz) activity, which indexed altered dynamics of attentional engagement to distracters. Additionally, standard stimuli were associated with increased early event-related alpha phase synchrony (inter-trial coherence) and evoked theta (4-8 Hz) phase synchrony, suggesting enhanced processing of the habituated standard background stimuli. Finally, during meditation, there was a greater differential early-evoked gamma power to the different stimulus classes. Correlation analysis indicated that this effect stemmed from a meditation state-related increase in early distracter-evoked gamma power and phase synchrony specific to longer-term expert practitioners. The findings suggest that Vipassana meditation evokes a brain state of enhanced perceptual clarity and decreased automated reactivity.
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 |
Citations in the library
Cited by 59
- Contemplating Mindfulness at Work Journal of Management November 19, 2015
- A systematic review of the neurophysiology of mindfulness on EEG oscillations Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews 2015
- Review of the Neural Oscillations Underlying Meditation Frontiers in Neuroscience March 26, 2018
- The Decoupled Mind: Mind-wandering Disrupts Cortical Phase-locking to Perceptual Events Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience April 17, 2014
- Future directions in meditation research: Recommendations for expanding the field of contemplative science PLoS One November 7, 2018
and 54 more in the library
Cites 34
- Prevention of relapse/recurrence in major depression by mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 2000
- Experience sampling during fMRI reveals default network and executive system contributions to mind wandering. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences May 26, 2009
- Meditation experience is associated with differences in default mode network activity and connectivity Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences November 23, 2011
- Long-term meditators self-induce high-amplitude gamma synchrony during mental practice Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences November 8, 2004
- Attending to the present: mindfulness meditation reveals distinct neural modes of self-reference Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience August 13, 2007
and 29 more in the library