Skip to content

Research papers

35,897 articles (and counting)

The benefits of being present: Mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being.

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 2003 Kirk Warren Brown, Richard M. Ryan 13,338 citations

Mindfulness is an attribute of consciousness long believed to promote well-being. This research provides a theoretical and empirical examination of the role of mindfulness in psychological well-being. The development and psychometric properties of the dispositional Mindful Attention Awareness Scale (MAAS) are described. Correlational, quasi-experimental, and laboratory studies then show that...

A default mode of brain function

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences January 16, 2001 Marcus E. Raichle, Ann Mary MacLeod, Abraham Z. Snyder et al. 12,440 citations

A baseline or control state is fundamental to the understanding of most complex systems. Defining a baseline state in the human brain, arguably our most complex system, poses a particular challenge. Many suspect that left unconstrained, its activity will vary unpredictably. Despite this prediction we identify a baseline state of the normal adult human brain in terms of the brain oxygen...

Using Self-Report Assessment Methods to Explore Facets of Mindfulness

Assessment January 27, 2006 Ruth A. Baer, Gregory T. Smith, Jaclyn Hopkins et al. 7,526 citations

The authors examine the facet structure of mindfulness using five recently developed mindfulness questionnaires. Two large samples of undergraduate students completed mindfulness questionnaires and measures of other constructs. Psychometric properties of the mindfulness questionnaires were examined, including internal consistency and convergent and discriminant relationships with other...

Mindfulness: A proposed operational definition.

Clinical Psychology Science and Practice 2004 Scott R. Bishop, Mark A. Lau, Shauna L. Shapiro et al. 6,266 citations

There has been substantial interest in mindfulness as an approach to reduce cognitive vulnerability to stress and emotional distress in recent years. However, thus far mindfulness has not been defined operationally. This paper describes the results of recent meetings held to establish a consensus on mindfulness and to develop conjointly a testable operational definition. We propose a...

Mindfulness training as a clinical intervention: A conceptual and empirical review.

Clinical Psychology Science and Practice 2003 Ruth A. Baer 4,203 citations

Interventions based on training in mindfulness skills are becoming increasingly popular. Mindfulness involves intentionally bringing one’s attention to the internal and external experiences occurring in the present moment, and is often taught through a variety of meditation exercises. This review summarizes conceptual approaches to mindfulness and empirical research on the utility of...

The Brain's Default Mode Network

Annual Review of Neuroscience May 4, 2015 Marcus E. Raichle 4,082 citations

The brain's default mode network consists of discrete, bilateral and symmetrical cortical areas, in the medial and lateral parietal, medial prefrontal, and medial and lateral temporal cortices of the human, nonhuman primate, cat, and rodent brains. Its discovery was an unexpected consequence of brain-imaging studies first performed with positron emission tomography in which various novel,...

Mechanisms of mindfulness

Journal of Clinical Psychology December 29, 2005 Shauna L. Shapiro, Linda E. Carlson, John A. Astin et al. 3,933 citations

Recently, the psychological construct mindfulness has received a great deal of attention. The majority of research has focused on clinical studies to evaluate the efficacy of mindfulness-based interventions. This line of research has led to promising data suggesting mindfulness-based interventions are effective for treatment of both psychological and physical symptoms. However, an equally...

A Randomized Trial of an N-methyl-D-aspartate Antagonist in Treatment-Resistant Major Depression

Archives of General Psychiatry August 1, 2006 Carlos A. Zarate, Jaskaran Singh, Paul J. Carlson et al. 3,762 citations

CONTEXT: Existing therapies for major depression have a lag of onset of action of several weeks, resulting in considerable morbidity. Exploring pharmacological strategies that have rapid onset of antidepressant effects within a few days and that are sustained would have an enormous impact on patient care. Converging lines of evidence suggest the role of the glutamatergic system in the...

Mindfulness: Theoretical Foundations and Evidence for its Salutary Effects

Psychological Inquiry October 19, 2007 Kirk Warren Brown, Richard M. Ryan, J. David Creswell 3,622 citations

Interest in mindfulness and its enhancement has burgeoned in recent years. In this article, we discuss in detail the nature of mindfulness and its relation to other, established theories of attention and awareness in day-to-day life. We then examine theory and evidence for the role of mindfulness in curtailing negative functioning and enhancing positive outcomes in several important life...

Subanesthetic Effects of the Noncompetitive NMDA Antagonist, Ketamine, in Humans

Archives of General Psychiatry March 1, 1994 John H. Krystal 3,339 citations

BACKGROUND: To characterize further behavioral, cognitive, neuroendocrine, and physiological effects of subanesthetic doses of ketamine hydrochloride in healthy human subjects. Ketamine, a phencyclidine hydrochloride derivative, is a dissociative anesthetic and a noncompetitive antagonist of the N-methyl-D-aspartate subtype of excitatory amino acid receptor. METHODS: Nineteen healthy subjects...

How Does Mindfulness Meditation Work? Proposing Mechanisms of Action From a Conceptual and Neural Perspective

Perspectives on Psychological Science October 14, 2011 Britta K. Hölzel, Sara W. Lazar, Tim Gard et al. 2,997 citations

Cultivation of mindfulness, the nonjudgmental awareness of experiences in the present moment, produces beneficial effects on well-being and ameliorates psychiatric and stress-related symptoms. Mindfulness meditation has therefore increasingly been incorporated into psychotherapeutic interventions. Although the number of publications in the field has sharply increased over the last two decades,...

Construct Validity of the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire in Meditating and Nonmeditating Samples

Assessment February 29, 2008 Ruth A. Baer, Gregory T. Smith, Emily L. B. Lykins et al. 2,933 citations

Previous research on assessment of mindfulness by self-report suggests that it may include five component skills: observing, describing, acting with awareness, nonjudging of inner experience, and nonreactivity to inner experience. These elements of mindfulness can be measured with the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ). The authors investigated several aspects of the construct validity...

Alterations in Brain and Immune Function Produced by Mindfulness Meditation

Psychosomatic Medicine July 1, 2003 Richard J. Davidson, Jon Kabat‐zinn, Jessica R. Schumacher et al. 2,924 citations

OBJECTIVE: The underlying changes in biological processes that are associated with reported changes in mental and physical health in response to meditation have not been systematically explored. We performed a randomized, controlled study on the effects on brain and immune function of a well-known and widely used 8-week clinical training program in mindfulness meditation applied in a work...

Recent advances in the phencyclidine model of schizophrenia

American Journal of Psychiatry October 1, 1991 2,916 citations

OBJECTIVE: Phencyclidine (PCP, "angel dust") induces a psychotomimetic state that closely resembles schizophrenia. As opposed to amphetamine-induced psychosis, PCP-induced psychosis incorporates both positive (e.g., hallucinations, paranoia) and negative (e.g., emotional withdrawal, motor retardation) schizophrenic symptoms. PCP-induced psychosis also uniquely incorporates the formal thought...

mTOR-Dependent Synapse Formation Underlies the Rapid Antidepressant Effects of NMDA Antagonists

Science August 19, 2010 Nanxin Li, Boyoung Lee, Rongjian Liu et al. 2,875 citations

The rapid antidepressant response after ketamine administration in treatment-resistant depressed patients suggests a possible new approach for treating mood disorders compared to the weeks or months required for standard medications. However, the mechanisms underlying this action of ketamine [a glutamate N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA) receptor antagonist] have not been identified. We observed...

Prevention of relapse/recurrence in major depression by mindfulness-based cognitive therapy.

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 2000 John D. Teasdale, Zindel V. Segal, James Williams et al. 2,613 citations

This study evaluated mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), a group intervention designed to train recovered recurrently depressed patients to disengage from dysphoria-activated depressogenic thinking that may mediate relapse/recurrence. Recovered recurrently depressed patients (n = 145) were randomized to continue with treatment as usual or, in addition, to receive MBCT....

Open hearts build lives: Positive emotions, induced through loving-kindness meditation, build consequential personal resources.

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology October 27, 2008 Barbara L. Fredrickson, Michael Cohn, Kimberly A. Coffey et al. 2,359 citations

B. L. Fredrickson's (1998, 2001) broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions asserts that people's daily experiences of positive emotions compound over time to build a variety of consequential personal resources. The authors tested this build hypothesis in a field experiment with working adults (n = 139), half of whom were randomly-assigned to begin a practice of loving-kindness meditation....

Meditation Programs for Psychological Stress and Well-being

JAMA Internal Medicine January 6, 2014 Madhav Goyal, Sonal Singh, Erica Sibinga et al. 2,323 citations

IMPORTANCE: Many people meditate to reduce psychological stress and stress-related health problems. To counsel people appropriately, clinicians need to know what the evidence says about the health benefits of meditation. OBJECTIVE: To determine the efficacy of meditation programs in improving stress-related outcomes (anxiety, depression, stress/distress, positive mood, mental health-related...

Assessment of Mindfulness by Self-Report

Assessment September 1, 2004 Ruth A. Baer, Gregory T. Smith, Kristin B. Allen 2,283 citations

A self-report inventory for the assessment of mindfulness skills was developed, and its psychometric characteristics and relationships with other constructs were examined. Participants included three samples of undergraduate students and a sample of outpatients with borderline personality disorder Based on discussions of mindfulness in the current literature, four mindfulness skills were...

Resting-State Functional Connectivity Reflects Structural Connectivity in the Default Mode Network

Cerebral Cortex April 9, 2008 M. D. Greicius, K. Supekar, V. Menon et al. 2,227 citations

Resting-state functional connectivity magnetic resonance imaging (fcMRI) studies constitute a growing proportion of functional brain imaging publications. This approach detects temporal correlations in spontaneous blood oxygen level-dependent (BOLD) signal oscillations while subjects rest quietly in the scanner. Although distinct resting-state networks related to vision, language, executive...

Psilocybin produces substantial and sustained decreases in depression and anxiety in patients with life-threatening cancer: A randomized double-blind trial

Journal of Psychopharmacology November 30, 2016 Annie Umbricht, Mary P Cosimano, Roland R. Griffiths et al. 2,174 citations

Cancer patients often develop chronic, clinically significant symptoms of depression and anxiety. Previous studies suggest that psilocybin may decrease depression and anxiety in cancer patients. The effects of psilocybin were studied in 51 cancer patients with life-threatening diagnoses and symptoms of depression and/or anxiety. This randomized, double-blind, cross-over trial investigated the...

Detecting Awareness in the Vegetative State

Science September 7, 2006 Adrian M. Owen, Martin R. Coleman, Melanie Boly et al. 1,974 citations

We used functional magnetic resonance imaging to demonstrate preserved conscious awareness in a patient fulfilling the criteria for a diagnosis of vegetative state. When asked to imagine playing tennis or moving around her home, the patient activated predicted cortical areas in a manner indistinguishable from that of healthy volunteers.

Effectiveness of a meditation-based stress reduction program in the treatment of anxiety disorders

American Journal of Psychiatry July 1, 1992 1,950 citations

OBJECTIVE: This study was designed to determine the effectiveness of a group stress reduction program based on mindfulness meditation for patients with anxiety disorders. METHOD: The 22 study participants were screened with a structured clinical interview and found to meet the DSM-III-R criteria for generalized anxiety disorder or panic disorder with or without agoraphobia. Assessments,...