Abstract
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 global-local letter task-to assess the effect of Isha yoga meditation on attentional resource allocation. 82 Isha yoga practitioners were tested at the beginning and at the end of the retreat. Our results showed an increase in correct responses specific to incongruent stimuli in the Stroop task. Congruently, a positive correlation between previous meditation experience and accuracy to incongruent Stroop stimuli was also observed at baseline. We also observed a reduction of the attentional blink. Unexpectedly, a negative correlation between previous meditation experience and attentional blink performance at baseline was observed. Regarding spatial attention orientation as assessed using the global-local letter task, participants showed a bias toward local processing. Only slight differences in performance were found pre- vs. post- meditation retreat. Biasing toward the local stimuli in the global-local task and negative correlation of previous meditation experience with attentional blink performance is consistent with Isha practices being focused-attention practices. Given the relatively small effect sizes and the absence of a control group, our results do not allow clear support nor rejection of the hypothesis of meditation-driven neuronal plasticity in the attentional system for Isha yoga practice.
Highlights
Behavioral results show that meditation practice increases performance in attentional tasks suggesting improved allocation of attentional resources, enhanced sustained attention skills, faster re-allocation of attentional resources, improved cognitive flexibility, and decreases in automatic responding (Valentine and Sweet, 1999; Carter et al, 2005; Cahn and Polich, 2006; Slagter et al, 2007; Hodgins and Adair, 2010)
We found a significant diminution of the Stroop Interference after the retreat compared to before the retreat (p < 0.05, mean SI at pre-retreat test was 1.8, mean SI at post-retreat test was 0.8)
We found no significant main effects of the retreat on accuracy or reaction time in the incongruent trials of the global-local task a pattern of relatively faster reaction times on the local task relative to the global task both pre and post retreat indicated that this cohort flexible executive attention and reduction in automatic responding measured through the Stroop color-word interference task is one of the domains of attention positively affected through this meditative practice
Summary
Behavioral results show that meditation practice increases performance in attentional tasks suggesting improved allocation of attentional resources, enhanced sustained attention skills, faster re-allocation of attentional resources, improved cognitive flexibility, and decreases in automatic responding (Valentine and Sweet, 1999; Carter et al, 2005; Cahn and Polich, 2006; Slagter et al, 2007; Hodgins and Adair, 2010). These changes are most likely linked to structural, anatomical and functional changes observed in meditators compared to control populations (Hoelzel et al, 2011; Luders et al, 2011, 2012; Kang et al, 2013). The “automatic self transcending” category has been proposed to denote practices marked by the absence of individual control or effort during meditation leading to a transcending of the sense of self as a separate choosing agent, a www.frontiersin.org
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
