Pulling yourself together: Meditation promotes congruence between implicit and explicit self-esteem

Mining the Mind: Linear Discriminant Analysis of MEG Source Reconstruction Time Series Supports Dynamic Changes in Deep Brain Regions During Meditation Sessions

Meditation practices have been claimed to have a positive effect on the regulation of mood and emotions for quite some time by practitioners, and in recent times there has been a sustained effort to provide a more precise description of the influence of meditation on the human brain. Longitudinal studies have reported morphological changes in cortical thickness and volume in selected brain regions due to meditation practice, which is interpreted as an evidence its effectiveness beyond the subjective self reporting. Using magnetoencephalography (MEG) or electroencephalography to quantify the changes in brain activity during meditation practice represents a challenge, as no clear hypothesis about the spatial or temporal pattern of such changes is available to date. In this article we consider MEG data collected during meditation sessions of experienced Buddhist monks practicing focused attention (Samatha) and open monitoring (Vipassana) meditation, contrasted by resting state with eyes closed. The MEG data are first mapped to time series of brain activity averaged over brain regions corresponding to a standard Destrieux brain atlas. Next, by bootstrapping and spectral analysis, the data are mapped to matrices representing random samples of power spectral densities in [Formula: see text], [Formula: see text], [Formula: see text], and [Formula: see text] frequency bands. We use linear discriminant analysis to demonstrate that the samples corresponding to different meditative or resting states contain enough fingerprints of the brain state to allow a separation between different states, and we identify the brain regions that appear to contribute to the separation. Our findings suggest that the cingulate cortex, insular cortex and some of the internal structures, most notably the accumbens, the caudate and the putamen nuclei, the thalamus and the amygdalae stand out as separating regions, which seems to correlate well with earlier findings based on longitudinal studies.

Being mindful does not always benefit everyone: mindfulness-based practices may promote alienation among psychologically vulnerable people

A growing number of interventions have sought to cultivate mindfulness, an accepting awareness of body and mind experiences. A great deal of prior research has shown mostly beneficial effects of mindfulness interventions. However, cultivating mindfulness may not always be beneficial for everyone. Two studies examined whether mindfulness may have alienating effects among people high in state orientation (i.e. low self-regulatory abilities). Participants were randomly assigned to either a 90-minute mindfulness training plus 5-minute retreatment or a waiting list control group (Study 1 N = 54, Study 2 N = 155). Alienation was operationalised as false self-ascriptions (FSA rate) of extrinsic goals that were allegedly recommended by experts. Participants high (versus low) in state orientation had significantly higher FSA rates in the mindfulness (versus control) condition. These results suggest that mindfulness training may alienate psychologically vulnerable populations (e.g. state-oriented people) from their intrinsic emotional preferences.

Revisiting the Organismic Valuing Process Theory of Personal Growth: A Theoretical Review of Rogers and Its Connection to Positive Psychology

Humanistic and positive psychology have had a contentious past. Initially, positive psychology researchers have distanced themselves from humanistic psychology, proceeding to build an array of differentiated constructs relevant to an empirical study of well-being. Twenty years on, it is now generally acknowledged that humanistic psychology is the theoretical predecessor of positive psychology in terms of holistic growth theories. In this theoretical review, we aim to show how Carl Rogers’ organismic valuing process (OVP) theory can serve as a holistic framework for individual positive psychological research findings and theories and how positive psychology, in turn, provides empirical support for this meta-theoretical framework. An important motivation for considering personal growth as a process that integrates various aspects of well-being is theoretical integration, which can help us better understand how well-being develops in individuals across the lifespan. Some theoretical and practical implications of incorporating OVP theory into well-being research are also suggested.

Mindfulness is not associated with dissonant attitudes but enhances the ability to cope with them

Background

Explicit and implicit attitudes have been studied extensively, but there is less attention to reducing dissonance between them. This is relevant because this dissonance (IED) results in distress and has inconsistent effects on behavior, e.g. less physical activity but more smoking. Mindfulness decreases dissonance between self-related explicit and implicit constructs. This study investigates if, and which, specific mindfulness subskills are associated with decreased dissonance between explicit and implicit attitudes, and whether mindfulness subskills moderate the relationship between IED and intention/behavior.

Method

At baseline and one and three months thereafter, participants’ (N = 1476) explicit attitudes, implicit attitudes, red meat consumption (RMC), intention to reduce RMC as well as levels of trait mindfulness were assessed.

Results

Mindfulness subskills were not associated with decreased IED. IED was associated with lower RMC and a higher intention to reduce RMC. The mindfulness subskill acceptance buffered the effect of IED on intention, seemingly offering a skill to deal with dissonant attitudes, which was unidentified until now.

Conclusion

The mindfulness subskill accepting without judgment functions as a way to deal with dissonance. Future research should use this novel finding and investigate whether mindfulness can be used as a buffer in contexts where dissonance results in maladaptive behaviors.

An Examination of Whether Mindfulness Can Predict the Relationship Between Objective and Subjective Attitudinal Ambivalence

Ambivalence is a mixed reaction toward an attitudinal object. Ambivalence is often viewed as aversive and people are motivated to reduce it. However, the presence of both strong positive and negative attitudes toward an object (objective ambivalence; OA) does not always lead to consciously experienced conflicted and torn feelings (subjective ambivalence; SA) or psychological discomfort. We hypothesized that the way people think about their inner experience can affect whether ambivalent attitudes lead to increased conflicted feelings. In five studies, we examined whether mindfulness predicts the relationship between objective and subjective ambivalence. We predicted that the acceptance aspect of mindfulness would attenuate the relationship between OA and SA, based on the idea that acceptance makes people more tolerant and less judgmental toward their inner states in general (and OA in particular). Although some findings across five studies were consistent with the prediction showing that acceptance attenuated the OA–SA relationship, other findings were not and even showed that acceptance strengthened the OA–SA relationship. A meta-analysis of the interaction effect across all studies failed to find support for predictions (r = -0.036 and 95% CI [-0.087; 0.022]). We discuss possible reasons for these mixed findings, and the implications of these studies.

Training novice practitioners to reliably report their meditation experience using shared phenomenological dimensions

Empirical descriptions of the phenomenology of meditation states rely on practitioners' ability to provide accurate information on their experience. We present a meditation training protocol that was designed to equip naive participants with a theoretical background and experiential knowledge that would enable them to share their experience. Subsequently, novices carried on with daily practice during several weeks before participating in experiments. Using a neurophenomenological experiment designed to explore two different meditation states (focused attention and open monitoring), we found that self-reported phenomenological ratings (i) were sensitive to meditation states, (ii) reflected meditation dose and fatigue effects, and (iii) correlated with behavioral measures (variability of response time). Each of these effects was better predicted by features of participants' daily practice than by desirable responding. Our results provide evidence that novice practitioners can reliably report their experience along phenomenological dimensions and warrant the future investigation of this training protocol with a longitudinal design.

Ways of coping with excessive academic stress among Korean adolescents during leisure time

PURPOSE

Korean adolescents are under excessive academic pressure because of the competitive college entrance examination. This study examined the characteristics of coping strategies on the academic stress experienced by senior high school students in Korea.

METHODS

A total of 11 adolescents who were preparing for the college entrance examination participated in this study. This study employed semi-structured in-depth interviews. A constructive grounded theory was employed to capture the characteristics of stress-coping strategies among adolescents.

RESULTS

After analyzing the data, we identified four themes as strategic attributes of stress-coping for academic stress among Korean adolescents: (a) creating coping strategies in a physically active manner; (b) creating coping strategies in a non-physical and positive form; (c) utilizing maladaptive coping mechanisms; and (d) relying upon religious belief and spiritual power.

CONCLUSION

This study indicates that Korean adolescents developed their own coping strategies to deal with various academic stressors through either positive or negative forms of leisure.

Emotionally aligned: Preliminary results on the effects of a mindfulness-based intervention for depression on congruence between implicit and explicit mood

BACKGROUND

Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) are effective in treating major depression. Because mindfulness involves monitoring and accepting current experiences, it may lead people resolve incongruencies between emotional responses that would otherwise remain unnoticed. Mindfulness may thus foster congruence between implicit and explicit emotions. The current randomized controlled trial tested this notion.

METHODS

N = 39 patients with an acute depressive episode were randomly assigned to an 8-week MBI (n = 24) or a psychopharmacological consultation condition (n = 15). Explicit and implicit mood and depressive symptoms were assessed before treatment and at the end of treatment.

RESULTS

Compared with the control condition, patients receiving MBI demonstrated higher congruence between implicit and explicit negative mood after treatment. There was no such difference in congruence of implicit and explicit positive mood. Additional analyses showed that only within the MBI group, individual differences in explicit mood became less stable. In contrast, individual differences in implicit mood remained stable in both groups.

LIMITATIONS

There was no control group including an active psychological intervention, the sample was small, and emotional congruence was not assessed within persons.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings correspond with the idea that mindfulness reduces incongruencies between implicit and explicit emotional responses. We found preliminary evidence for this effect for negative emotional responses. There was suggestive evidence that congruence arose from the alignment of explicit responses (which became less stable) to implicit responses (which remained stable). Studying the interplay between implicit and explicit processes may shed light on the working mechanisms of clinical-psychological interventions.

People have access to implicit self-esteem unless they do not apply an ego defence

Background

Early definitions of implicit self-esteem (ISE) assumed its unconscious character. Although researchers have shown ways to achieve consistency between explicit and implicit self-esteem measures, no one has demonstrated that people may be aware of their ISE.

Participants and procedure

In the experiment with 85 participants aged from 19 to 45 years a “lie detector” procedure was used to overcome the self-enhancement bias. The definition of ISE, given to participants, referred to the phenomenon, manifested in popular ISE measures.

Results

In participants who were convinced that they were being assessed in the presence of a lie detector, a significant correlation between referred and actual ISE was shown. Individuals characterised by defensive high self-esteem in natural conditions were less accurate in ISE estimation than those with secure high self-esteem.

Conclusions

The results, demonstrating people’s access to their implicit self-esteem, may have important implications for clinical, well-being, self-acceptance, or educational issues.

A Brief Mindfulness Exercise Promotes the Correspondence Between the Implicit Affiliation Motive and Goal Setting

People often choose to pursue goals that are dissociated from their implicit motives, which jeopardizes their motivation and well-being. We hypothesized that mindfulness may attenuate this dissociation to the degree that it increases sensitivity to internal cues that signal one's implicit preferences. We tested this hypothesis with a longitudinal repeated measures experiment. In Session 1, participants' implicit affiliation motive was assessed. In Session 2, half of the participants completed a mindfulness exercise while the other half completed a control task before indicating their motivation toward pursuing affiliation and nonaffiliation goals. In Session 3, this procedure was repeated with reversed assignment to conditions. The results confirmed our hypothesis that, irrespective of the order of the conditions, the implicit affiliation motive predicted a preference to pursue affiliation goals immediately after the mindfulness exercise, but not after the control task. We discuss implications of these findings for satisfaction and well-being.

On the Attitudinal Consequences of Being Mindful

A series of studies examined whether mindfulness is associated with the experience of attitudinal ambivalence. Studies 1A and 1B found that mindful individuals expressed greater comfort holding ambivalent views and reported feeling ambivalent less often. More mindful individuals also responded more positively to feelings of uncertainty (as assessed in Study 1B). Study 2 replicated these effects and demonstrated that mindful individuals had lower objective and subjective ambivalence across a range of attitude objects but did not differ in attitude valence, extremity, positivity/negativity, strength, or the need to evaluate. Study 3 showed that the link between greater ambivalence and negative affect was buffered by mindfulness, such that there was no link between the amount of ambivalence and negative affect among more mindful individuals. The results are discussed with respect to the benefits of mindfulness in relation to ambivalence and affect.

Mindfulness Interventions

Mindfulness interventions aim to foster greater attention to and awareness of present moment experience. There has been a dramatic increase in randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of mindfulness interventions over the past two decades. This article evaluates the growing evidence of mindfulness intervention RCTs by reviewing and discussing (a) the effects of mindfulness interventions on health, cognitive, affective, and interpersonal outcomes; (b) evidence-based applications of mindfulness interventions to new settings and populations (e.g., the workplace, military, schools); (c) psychological and neurobiological mechanisms of mindfulness interventions; (d) mindfulness intervention dosing considerations; and (e) potential risks of mindfulness interventions. Methodologically rigorous RCTs have demonstrated that mindfulness interventions improve outcomes in multiple domains (e.g., chronic pain, depression relapse, addiction). Discussion focuses on opportunities and challenges for mindfulness intervention research and on community applications.

Losing Your Gut Feelings. Intuition in Depression

Whereas in basic research, intuition has become a topic of great interest, clinical research and depression research in specific have not applied to the topic of intuition, yet. This is astonishing because a well-known phenomenon during depression is that patients have difficulties to judge and decide. In contrast to healthy individuals who take most daily life decisions intuitively (Kahneman, 2011), depressed individuals seem to have difficulties to come to fast and adaptive decisions. The current article pursues three goals. First, our aim is to establish the hypothesis that intuition is impaired in depression against the background of influential theoretical accounts as well as empirical evidence from basic and clinical research. The second aim of the current paper is to provide explanations for recent findings on the depression-intuition interplay and to present directions for future research that may help to broaden our understanding of decision difficulties in depression. Third, we seek to propose ideas on how therapeutic interventions can support depressed individuals in taking better decisions. Even though our knowledge regarding this topic is still limited, we will tentatively launch the idea that an important first step may be to enhance patients' access to intuitions. Overall, this paper seeks to introduce the topic of intuition to clinical research on depression and to hereby set the stage for upcoming theory and practice.

The Role of Individual and Collective Mindfulness in Promoting Occupational Safety in Health Care

Although the importance of safety regulations is highly emphasized in hospitals, nurses frequently work around, or intentionally bypass, safety regulations. We argue that work-arounds occur because adhering to safety regulations usually requires more time and work process design often lacks complementarity with safety regulations. Our main proposition is that mindfulness is associated with a decrease in occupational safety failures through a decrease in work-arounds. First, we propose that individual mindfulness may prevent the depletion of motivational resources caused by worrying about the consequences of time lost when adhering to safety regulations. Second, we argue that collective mindfulness may provide nursing teams with a cognitive infrastructure that facilitates the detection and adaptation of work processes. The results of a multilevel analysis of 580 survey responses from nurses are consistent with our propositions. Our multilevel analytic approach enables us to account for the unique variance in work-arounds that individual and collective mindfulness explain.

Bridging the Sciences of Mindfulness and Romantic Relationships

Research on mindfulness, defined as paying conscious and non-judgmental attention to present-moment experiences, has increased rapidly in the past decade but has focused almost entirely on the benefits of mindfulness for individual well-being. This article considers the role of mindfulness in romantic relationships. Although strong claims have been made about the potentially powerful role of mindfulness in creating better relationships, it is less clear whether, when, and how this may occur. This article integrates the literatures on mindfulness and romantic relationship science, and sketches a theory-driven model and future research agenda to test possible pathways of when and how mindfulness may affect romantic relationship functioning. We review some initial direct and indirect evidence relevant to the proposed model. Finally, we discuss the implications of how studying mindfulness may further our understanding of romantic relationship (dys)functioning, and how mindfulness may be a promising and effective tool in couple interventions.

Improving personality/character traits in individuals with alcohol dependence: the influence of mindfulness-oriented meditation

The study of personality is critical to enhance current knowledge of the psychological characteristics of alcohol dependence. Recent evidence shows that mindfulness-oriented meditation positively influences healthy individuals' character. Here, it was assessed whether 8-week mindfulness-oriented meditation promotes similar changes in a group of alcohol-dependent individuals. A control group with alcohol dependence was also tested. Mindfulness-oriented meditation participants showed an increase in the character scores of the temperament and character inventory together with reduced risks of relapse. These longitudinal data highlight the importance of assessing personality in alcohol-dependent individuals and support the utility of therapeutic interventions for alcohol dependence aimed at enhancing individuals' character.

Effect of Dynamic Meditation on Mental Health

Although traditional meditation has been found to be effective in improving physical and mental health of subjects, there was a paucity of research of the effect of active or dynamic meditation on these variables. Therefore, the present study was aimed at studying the effect of dynamic meditation on mental health of the subjects. Total sample of the present study comprised 60 subjects, 30 each in experimental and control group. Subjects in experimental group were given 21-day training in dynamic meditation. Mental health of the experimental and control group subjects was measured in pre- and post-condition with the help of Mental Health Inventory developed by Jagadish and Srivastava (Mental Health inventory, Manovaigyanik Parikshan Sansthan, Varanasi, 1983). Obtained data were analyzed with the help of ANCOVA. In post-condition, experimental group scored better than control group on integration of personality, autonomy and environmental mastery. Effect sizes of dynamic meditation on these dimensions of mental health were large. However, experimental group and control group did not differ significantly on positive self-evaluation, perception of reality and group-oriented attitude dimensions of mental health in post-condition. Overall, dynamic meditation training was effective in improving mental health of the subjects.

Development of managers’ emotional competencies: mind-body training implication

Purpose

– This paper aims to research about the effect of mind–body training on the development of emotional competencies of managers.

Design/methodology/approach

– Quasi-experimental design, i.e. before and after (test–retest).

Findings

– Results showed that the experimental group, after training, achieved around 15 per cent higher scores compared to results before training on all three subscales of an emotional skills and competence questionnaire (ESCQ-45), a statistically significant improvement in scores. The control group (no training) scores showed no significant difference. This result indicates support for the view that emotional intelligence may be treated as a competency and is responsive to training programmes.

Research limitations/implications

– Emotional competencies are still a contested concept. The participants may provide socially desirable responses because of the self-assessment questionnaires. The sample is not a representative sample of European managers; hence, there is a limited generalisability of the results.

Practical implications

– These research findings indicate Mind–body training is a practical method for people to improve the management of their emotions, and hence impact positively on core organisational activities.

Originality/value

– This is the first research on this mind-body training (emotional relief technique) in an eight-week programme in a management context. The findings indicate the positive impact that can be achieved on emotional competencies scores from this method of self-development.

Overcoming the Barriers to Self-Knowledge: Mindfulness as a Path to Seeing Yourself as You Really Are

People's beliefs about their personality, or how they typically think, feel, and behave, correspond somewhat to objective accuracy criteria. Yet recent research has highlighted the fact that there are many blind spots in self-knowledge and that these blind spots can have fairly negative consequences. What can people do to improve self-knowledge? The current article suggests that the construct of mindfulness, defined as paying attention to one's current experience in a nonevaluative way, may serve as a path to self-knowledge. Specifically, mindfulness appears to directly address the two major barriers to self-knowledge: informational barriers (i.e., the quantity and quality of information people have about themselves) and motivational barriers (i.e., ego-protective motives that affect how people process information about themselves). This article reviews the available evidence supporting the hypothesis that mindfulness improves self-knowledge and outlines promising future directions that might firmly establish an empirical link between mindfulness and self-knowledge.

Mindfulness meditation and explicit and implicit indicators of personality and self-concept changes

The scientific interest on mindfulness meditation (MM) has significantly increased in the last two decades probably because of the positive health effects that this practice exerts in a great variety of clinical and non-clinical conditions. Despite attention regulation, emotional regulation, and body awareness have been argued to be critical mechanisms through which MM improves well-being, much less is known on the effects of this practice on personality. Here we review the current state of knowledge about the role of MM in promoting changes in practitioners’ personality profiles and self-concepts. We first focus on studies that investigated the relations between mindfulness and personality using well-known self-report inventories such as the Five-Factor model of personality traits and the Temperament and Character Inventory. Second, based on the intrinsic limitations of these explicit personality measures, we review a key set of results showing effects of MM on implicit, as well as explicit, self-representations. Although the research on MM and personality is still in its infancy, it appears that this form of meditative practice may notably shape individuals’ personality and self-concept toward more healthy profiles.

Effects of an 8-week meditation program on the implicit and explicit attitudes toward religious/spiritual self-representations

Explicit self-representations often conflict with implicit and intuitive self-representations, with such discrepancies being seen as a source of psychological tension. Most of previous research on the psychological effects of mindfulness-meditation has assessed people's self-attitudes at an explicit level, leaving unknown whether mindfulness-meditation promotes changes on implicit self-representations. Here, we assessed the changes in implicit and explicit self-related religious/spiritual (RS) representations in healthy participants following an 8-week mindfulness-oriented meditation (MOM) program. Before and after meditation, participants were administered implicit (implicit association test) and explicit (self-reported questionnaires) RS measures. Relative to control condition, MOM led to increases of implicit RS in individuals whit low pre-existing implicit RS and to more widespread increases in explicit RS. On the assumption that MOM practice may enhance the clarity of one's transcendental thoughts and feelings, we argued that MOM allows people to transform their intuitive feelings of implicit RS as well as their explicit RS attitudes.

Brief mindfulness meditation training alters psychological and neuroendocrine responses to social evaluative stress

OBJECTIVE

To test whether a brief mindfulness meditation training intervention buffers self-reported psychological and neuroendocrine responses to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) in young adult volunteers. A second objective evaluates whether pre-existing levels of dispositional mindfulness moderate the effects of brief mindfulness meditation training on stress reactivity.

METHODS

Sixty-six (N=66) participants were randomly assigned to either a brief 3-day (25-min per day) mindfulness meditation training or an analytic cognitive training control program. All participants completed a standardized laboratory social-evaluative stress challenge task (the TSST) following the third mindfulness meditation or cognitive training session. Measures of psychological (stress perceptions) and biological (salivary cortisol, blood pressure) stress reactivity were collected during the social evaluative stress-challenge session.

RESULTS

Brief mindfulness meditation training reduced self-reported psychological stress reactivity but increased salivary cortisol reactivity to the TSST, relative to the cognitive training comparison program. Participants who were low in pre-existing levels of dispositional mindfulness and then received mindfulness meditation training had the greatest cortisol reactivity to the TSST. No significant main or interactive effects were observed for systolic or diastolic blood pressure reactivity to the TSST.

CONCLUSIONS

The present study provides an initial indication that brief mindfulness meditation training buffers self-reported psychological stress reactivity, but also increases cortisol reactivity to social evaluative stress. This pattern may indicate that initially brief mindfulness meditation training fosters greater active coping efforts, resulting in reduced psychological stress appraisals and greater cortisol reactivity during social evaluative stressors.

Internally directed cognition and mindfulness: an integrative perspective derived from predictive and reactive control systems theory

In the present paper, we will apply the predictive and reactive control systems (PARCS) theory as a framework that integrates competing theories of neural substrates of awareness by describing the "default mode network" (DMN) and anterior insula (AI) as parts of two different behavioral and homeostatic control systems. The DMN, a network that becomes active at rest when there is no external stimulation or task to perform, has been implicated in self-reflective awareness and prospection. By contrast, the AI is associated with awareness and task-related attention. This has led to competing theories stressing the role of the DMN in self-awareness vs. the role of interoceptive and emotional information integration in the AI in awareness of the emotional moment. In PARCS, the respective functions of the DMN and AI in a specific control system explains their association with different qualities of awareness, and how mental states can shift from one state (e.g., prospective self-reflection) to the other (e.g., awareness of the emotional moment) depending on the relative dominance of control systems. These shifts between reactive and predictive control are part of processes that enable the intake of novel information, integration of this novel information within existing knowledge structures, and the creation of a continuous personal context in which novel information can be integrated and understood. As such, PARCS can explain key characteristics of mental states, such as their temporal and spatial focus (e.g., a focus on the here and now vs. the future; a first person vs. a third person perspective). PARCS further relates mental states to brain states and functions, such as activation of the DMN or hemispheric asymmetry in frontal cortical functions. Together, PARCS deepens the understanding of a broad range of mental states, including mindfulness, mind wandering, rumination, autobiographical memory, imagery, and the experience of self.

An Alternative to Self-Reports of Trait and State Affect

Self-report measures for the assessment of trait or state affect are typically biased by social desirability or self-delusion. The present work provides an overview of research using a recently developed measure of automatic activation of cognitive representation of affective experiences, the Implicit Positive and Negative Affect Test (IPANAT). In the IPANAT, participants judge the extent to which nonsense words from an alleged artificial language express a number of affective states or traits. The test demonstrates appropriate factorial validity and reliabilities. We review findings that support criterion validity and, additionally, present novel variants of this procedure for the assessment of the discrete emotions such as happiness, anger, sadness, and fear.

Zen meditation and access to information in the unconscious

In two experiments and two different research paradigms, we tested the hypothesis that Zen meditation increases access to accessible but unconscious information. Zen practitioners who meditated in the lab performed better on the Remote Associate Test (RAT; Mednick, 1962) than Zen practitioners who did not meditate. In a new, second task, it was observed that Zen practitioners who meditated used subliminally primed words more than Zen practitioners who did not meditate. Practical and theoretical implications are discussed.

Mindful Attention Prevents Mindless Impulses

Three studies illustrate that mindful attention prevents impulses toward attractive food. Participants received a brief mindfulness procedure in which they observed their reactions to external stimuli as transient mental events rather than subjectively real experiences. Participants then applied this procedure to viewing pictures of highly attractive and neutral food items. Finally, reactions to food stimuli were assessed with an implicit approach-avoidance task. Across experiments, spontaneous approach reactions elicited by attractive food were fully eliminated in the mindful attention condition compared to the control condition, in which participants viewed the same items without mindful attention. These effects were maintained over a 5-minute distraction period. Our findings suggest that mindful attention to one’s own mental experiences helps to control impulsive responses and thus suggest mindfulness as a potentially powerful method for facilitating self-regulation.