Mindfulness meditation associated with alterations in bottom-up processing: psychophysiological evidence for reduced reactivity.
Paul A. M. van den Hurk, Barbara H Janssen, Fabio Giommi, Henk Barendregt, Stan C Gielen
International journal of psychophysiology : official journal of the International Organization of Psychophysiology November 2010 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2010.07.002 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Observational cohort Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Population | Mindfulness meditators and age- and gender-matched controls |
| Topics | Meditation |
| Key findings | Mindfulness meditators showed smaller or absent intersensory facilitation effects compared to controls, suggesting altered bottom-up processing. They also exhibited reduced interference from a visual warning stimulus, indicating improved attentional resource allocation across modalities. |
Abstract
Mental training by meditation has been related to changes in high-level cognitive functions that involve top-down processing. The aim of this study was to investigate whether the practice of meditation is also related to alterations in low-level, bottom-up processing. Therefore, intersensory facilitation (IF) effects in a group of mindfulness meditators (MM) were compared to IF effects in an age- and gender-matched control group. Smaller and even absent IF effects were found in the MM group, which suggests that changes in bottom-up processing are associated with MM. Furthermore, reduced interference of a visual warning stimulus with the IF effects was found, which suggests an improved allocation of attentional resources in mindfulness meditators, even across modalities.