Background: Chronic pain involves hypervigilance for pain-related stimuli. Selective attention to pain-related stimuli, known as pain attentional bias (AB), can exacerbate chronic pain, prolong suffering, and undermine quality of life. The aim of this study was to determine if a multimodal mindfulness-oriented intervention could significantly reduce pain AB among chronic pain patients receiving...
An impressive body of research indicates that expressive writing, which encourages participants to let go and explore their deepest thoughts and feelings while writing continuously, produces physical and psychological benefits.Mindfulness is defined as paying attention on pupose, in the present moment and nonjudgmentally, to the unfolding of experience moment by moment.Combining the concepts of...
Mindfulness-based therapy (MBT) has been used effectively to treat a variety of physical and psychological disorders, including depression, anxiety, and chronic pain. Recently, several lines of research have explored the potential for mindfulness-therapy in treating somatization disorders, including fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, and irritable bowel syndrome. Thirteen studies were...
Mindfulness meditation (MM) is an inward mental practice, in which a resting but alert state of mind is maintained. MM intervention was performed for a population of older people with high stress levels. This study assessed signal processing methodologies of electroencephalographic (EEG) and respiration signals during meditation and control condition to aid in quantification of the meditative...
Abstract Psychological interest in the impact of mental states on biological functioning is growing rapidly, driving a need for new methods for inducing mental states that last long enough, and are sufficiently impactful, to have significant effects on physical health. The many traditions of meditative practice are one potential pathway for studying mind‐body interactions. The purpose of this...
BACKGROUND/AIMS: Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) has enhanced cognition, positive emotion, and immunity in younger and middle-aged samples; its benefits are less well known for older persons. Here we report on a randomized controlled trial of MBSR for older adults and its effects on executive function, left frontal asymmetry of the EEG alpha band, and antibody response. METHODS: Older...
Mindfulness training aims to impact emotion regulation. Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) symptoms can be successfully addressed through mindfulness-based interventions. This preliminary study is the first to investigate neural mechanisms of symptom improvements in GAD following mindfulness training. Furthermore, we compared brain activation between GAD patients and healthy participants at...
Alastair Macaulay titles his 2008 New York Times review of the Merce Cunningham Company with the phrase ‘The Body’s War Within: Stillness vs. Motion’. In his portrayal of the Cunningham Company, he suggests that Cunningham in his 66 years was consistently investigating motion in stillness and stillness in motion to uncover inner qualities — serenity, rigour — that do not change even as their...
Prologue: Skepticism in Buddhism and Science Part I: Restoring Our Human Nature 1. Toward a Revolution in the Mind Sciences 2. Buddhism and Science: Confrontation and Collaboration 3. Buddhism and the Mind Sciences 4. A Three-Dimensional Science of Mind 5. Restoring Meaning to the Universe 6. What Makes Us Human? Scientific and Buddhist Views 7. Achieving Free Will Part II: Transcending Our...
Meditation has lately received considerable interest from cognitive neuroscience. Studies suggest that daily meditation leads to long lasting attentional and neuronal plasticity. We present changes related to the attentional systems before and after a 3 month intensive meditation retreat. We used three behavioral psychophysical tests - a Stroop task, an attentional blink task, and a...