Abstract
The present study sought to uncover the emotion regulatory properties of mindfulness by examining its effects—differentiated as a meditative practice, state of mind and dispositional trait—on the late positive potential (LPP), an event-related potentials (ERPs) indexing emotional processing. Results revealed that mindfulness as a meditative practice produced a reduction in the difference between the LPP response to negative high arousing and neutral stimuli across time. In contrast, a state mindfulness induction (i.e., instructions to attend to the stimuli mindfully) failed to modulate the LPP. Dispositional mindfulness, however, was related to modulation of the LPP as a function of meditation practice. Dispositional mindfulness was associated with a reduction of the LPP response to negative high arousal stimuli and the difference between negative high arousal and neutral stimuli in participants who listened to a control audio recording but not for those who engaged in the guided meditation practice. Together, these findings provide experimental evidence demonstrating that brief mindfulness meditation, but not deliberate engagement in state mindfulness, produces demonstrable changes in emotional processing indicative of reduced emotional reactivity. Importantly, these effects are akin to those observed in individuals with naturally high dispositional mindfulness, suggesting that the benefits of mindfulness can be cultivated through practice.
Highlights
Mindfulness, commonly referred to as a form of nonjudgmental present-focused attention (FA; Kabat-Zinn, 1990), has gained worldwide popularity as a distinct method to promote health and well-being
Most of the results were consistent with the purpose of our design and prior research, we found an unexpected positive correlation between the late sustained late positive potential (LPP) elicited from negative low arousal stimuli and dispositional mindfulness in the control condition
Our main finding was that a brief guided Open Monitoring (OM) meditation exercise produced a significant reduction in LPP response to negative stimuli over time, supporting the notion that OM mindfulness meditation attenuates emotional reactivity to aversive events (Lutz et al, 2008; Goldin and Gross, 2010)
Summary
Mindfulness, commonly referred to as a form of nonjudgmental present-focused attention (FA; Kabat-Zinn, 1990), has gained worldwide popularity as a distinct method to promote health and well-being. The proliferation of research documenting the benefits of mindfulness has led to its integration in a variety of efficacious psychotherapeutic interventions (see Baer, 2003; Tapper et al, 2009; Hofmann et al, 2010; Brewer et al, 2011). One explanatory mechanism for the therapeutic benefits of mindfulness involves its effects on emotion regulation (Lutz et al, 2008; for a review see Chambers et al, 2009), a critical self-control ability that is altered in many forms of psychopathology (Kring and Bachorowski, 1999; Aldao et al, 2010). Much work has uncovered the emotion regulatory benefits of mindfulness, less is known about its associated neural mechanisms
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