Mindfulness- and, more generally, meditation-based interventions increasingly gain popularity, effectively promoting cognitive, affective, and social capacities. It is unclear, however, if different types of practice have the same or specific effects on mental functioning. Here we tested three consecutive three-month training modules aimed at cultivating either attention, socio-affective...
Background/objective: The present research investigated potential effects of mindfulness training on emotion regulation and mood of future schoolteachers in a nonrandomized pre-post design, and whether these are influenced by the yoga component of mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) and/or by homework practice. Method: N = 169 university students received either mindfulness training...
BMC PsychiatryAugust 22, 2019Sunny Ho-Wan Chan, Samson Tse, Ka Fai Chung et al.8 citations
BACKGROUND: With the advent of the recovery movement in mental health, a humanistic paradigm shift has occurred, placing the focus on personal recovery (i.e., hope, identity, and life meaning) instead of functional or clinical recovery only (i.e., symptom reduction or increases in physical function). Along the journey of recovery, people with bipolar disorder (BD) struggle to cope with...
Interest has grown in using mindfulness meditation to treat conditions featuring excessive impulsivity. However, while prior studies find that mindfulness practice can improve attention, it remains unclear whether it improves other cognitive faculties whose deficiency can contribute to impulsivity. Here, an eight-week mindfulness intervention did not reduce impulsivity on the go/no-go task or...
Neuroscience LettersAugust 17, 2019Dana Dharmakaya Colgan, Tab Memmott, Dan Klee et al.
Purpose: This study used a multiple crossover ABAB single case design to examine intracranial EEG data during a breath awareness meditation and an active control task. Results: Visual analyses suggest that a brief breath awareness mediation was consistently associated with increased alpha power when compared to the active control. Less consistent effects were found with theta, beta, and high...
Background: In conservative and rural areas, where antidiscrimination laws do not exist, lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) people are at risk for excess stress arising from discrimination. Stress-reducing interventions delivered via innovative channels to overcome access barriers are needed. Objective: This study aimed to investigate the feasibility and acceptability of online mindfulness-based...
Background: Transcendental Meditation (TM) as a stress management technique may offer an adjunctive strategy to improve health and well-being in adults with cardiovascular disease (CVD). Objectives: To examine the efficacy of TM to improve aspects of cardiovascular health and psychological functioning in adults with CVD. Method: Studies (a) evaluating TM in adults with hypertension or CVD and...
Objective: Migraine headaches affect about approximately 15% of the population and some notable efforts have been made to develop meditation interventions to address pain and mood among this population. However, key active ingredients and the necessary duration of meditation interventions to produce an effect are still unknown. The purpose of this study is to assess key meditation ingredients...
Yoga and meditation have become mainstream practices in the United States, undertaken by 6 percent and 9 percent of the population, respectively, in 2007. In four articles, this master's thesis examines the practice of yoga and meditation by nontraditional populations. The first article is an overview piece on yoga and meditation, which explains what constitutes these practices, as well as who...
Fibromyalgia syndrome (FM) represents a great challenge for clinicians and researchers because the efficacy of currently available treatments is limited. The present study examined the efficacy of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) for reducing functional impairment as well as the role of mindfulness-related constructs as mediators of treatment outcomes for people with FM. 225...
Abstract This chapter examines the multiple roles that meditation plays in the lives of contemporary Buddhist monastics. Specifically, and drawing on rich ethnographic data, it focuses on the experiences of women who have taken Buddhist ordination within six different Buddhist groups and lineages in the British Isles. This chapter provides a brief history of the lived experience of meditation...
INTRODUCTION The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of mindfulness meditation using the Headspace™ app on mindfulness, mental well-being, and perceived stress in pharmacy students. METHODS Professional year one (P1), professional year two (P2,) and professional year 3 (P3) pharmacy students were recruited to participate. Students were instructed to meditate using the...
Attention is vital for optimal behavioural performance in every-day life. Mindfulness meditation has been shown to enhance attention. However, the components of attention altered by meditation and the related neural activities are underexplored. In particular, the contributions of inhibitory processes and sustained attention are not well understood. To address these points, 34 meditators were...
Objectives: Relatively little is known about who uses various types of meditation or how health problems and health care barriers might simultaneously impact its use. This article describes the current prevalence of meditation and identifies significant individual and health system-related factors associated with its use. Design: Cross-sectional descriptive analysis of the 2017 National Health...
Background Methadone maintenance therapy (MMT) is an efficacious form of medication assisted treatment for opioid use disorder (OUD), yet many individuals on MMT relapse. Chronic pain and deficits in positive affective response to natural rewards may result in dysphoria that fuels opioid craving and promotes relapse. As such, behavioral therapies that ameliorate chronic pain and enhance...
This study examined effects of a mindfulness induction on proximal and distal defense responses to mortality salience and negative affect. Three experimental conditions were included: mindfulness, mind-wandering, and worrying. Participants in the mindfulness condition underwent a mindfulness induction at the experiment’s outset, while participants in the other two conditions underwent a...
[Correction Notice: An Erratum for this article was reported in Vol 31(10) of Psychological Assessment (see record 2019-58643-005). The article should have been published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0). Therefore, the article was amended to list the authors as copyright holders, and information about the terms of the CC BY 3.0 was added to the author...
There is a growing and promising quantitative evidence base on mindfulness in schools, which has continued to emerge over the last two years and which consistently suggests small to moderate impacts across a range of outcomes, most strongly and reliably on psycho-social health and well-being, especially mental health problems, with less definitive but promising evidence for small effects on...
(1) Background: Mind-body interventions (MBI), such as meditation or other relaxation techniques, have become the focus of attention in the clinical and health sciences. Differences in the effects of induction techniques are being increasingly investigated. (2) Methods: Here, we compared changes in the individual experience of time, space, and self in 44 students in an integrative...
Chronic alcohol misuse can result in chronically elevated interleukin (IL)-6, a pro-inflammatory cytokine, in the bloodstream. Given that Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention (MBRP) has been shown to reduce alcohol misuse, MBRP might also be effective in reducing IL-6 concentrations. Past research has found, however, that IL-6 does not respond consistently to mindfulness-based interventions....