Despite advances in modern medicine, cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death in Australia and globally. In a recently published scientific statement on alternative methods to lower blood pressure (BP), the American Heart Association (AHA) reported that the Transcendental Meditation (TM) technique may be considered in clinical practice to lower BP. The AHA statement also...
Initial well-controlled studies have suggested that mindfulness training interventions can improve a broad range of mental and physical health outcomes (e.g., HIV pathogenesis, depression relapse, inflammation, drug abuse), yet the underlying pathways linking mindfulness and health are poorly understood. In this article, we offer a mindfulness stress buffering account to explain these health...
Few empirical studies have explored the associations between formal and informal mindfulness home practice and outcome in Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT). In this study ninety-nine participants randomised to MBCT in a multi-centre randomised controlled trial completed self-reported ratings of home practice over 7 treatment weeks. Recurrence of Major Depression was assessed...
Patients with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have significant medical morbidity, which may be mediated by hypothalamic pituitary axis (HPA) dysfunction and reflected in cortisol output. Many veterans with PTSD are hesitant to engage in trauma-focused exposure treatments; therefore briefer, non-exposure-based treatments are needed; one such promising approach is an abbreviated Primary Care...
The author reviews the literature on the relation between Buddhist meditation and psychoanalytic listening and argues that the influence of the dynamic unconscious is not addressed in this literature, which engenders a pragmatic overvaluation of attention and an accompanying unexamined devaluation of the analyst's experiences of inattention. The article emphasizes contemporary psychoanalytic...
Awareness is one of the two most important abilities cultivated in Goenka's Vipassana meditation, which refers to sensitivity to subtle bodily sensations and the associated psychological processes. This sensitivity and its derived function of monitoring emotion are not of notable concern in modern mindfulness-based psychotherapies. Evidence supports that Vipassana meditation truly enhances...
The aim was to explore how mindfulness group therapy for somatoform disorders influenced the patients' stress experiences, coping strategies and contextual psychosocial processes. A longitudinal pre- and post-treatment design, using 22 semi-structured individual pre- and post-treatment interviews. Data-analysis was based on a thematic methodology. Pre-treatment patients were struggling in an...
The first part of this paper describes the long history of the concept of Mindfulness. Contrary to the belief that Mindfulness only has Buddhist and Hindu origins, it is also rooted in Jewish, Islamic and Christian religions. Furthermore, western philosophers have described a mindful path to become more aware of thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations. Mindfulness can be considered as a...
The current research investigated whether mindfulness is differentially associated with thoughts that emphasize positive or negative valence. In Study 1, trait mindfulness was inversely associated with negative rumination but unassociated with positive rumination, controlling for state affect. In Study 2, participants completed either a mindful breathing meditation or a comparable control...
OBJECTIVES: Group mindfulness meditation interventions have improved symptoms in many health conditions. However, many people are unwilling to receive group treatment, so alternative delivery methods such as individual and internet may be a useful option. The study objective was to examine mindfulness meditation intervention delivery format preferences and their relationship to potential...