4.8 Article

Absence of structural brain changes from mindfulness-based stress reduction: Two combined randomized controlled trials

Journal

SCIENCE ADVANCES
Volume 8, Issue 20, Pages -

Publisher

AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abk3316

Keywords

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Funding

  1. National Institutes of Health, National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) [P01AT004952]
  2. National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) [R01-MH43454, P50-MH084051, T32MH018931]
  3. Fetzer Institute grant
  4. John Templeton Foundation
  5. National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development [P30 HD003352-449015, U54 HD090256]
  6. National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation

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In this study, a large combined dataset from two controlled trials was used to examine the effects of an 8-week mindfulness-based stress reduction course on brain structure. The results showed no evidence of neuroplastic changes compared to control groups, contradicting previous findings.
Studies purporting to show changes in brain structure following the popular, 8-week mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) course are widely referenced despite major methodological limitations. Here, we present findings from a large, combined dataset of two, three-arm randomized controlled trials with active and waitlist (WL) control groups. Meditation-naive participants (n = 218) completed structural magnetic resonance imaging scans during two visits: baseline and postintervention period. After baseline, participants were randomly assigned to WL (n = 70), an 8-week MBSR program (n = 75), or a validated, matched active control (n = 73). We assessed changes in gray matter volume, gray matter density, and cortical thickness. In the largest and most rigorously controlled study to date, we failed to replicate prior findings and found no evidence that MBSR produced neuroplastic changes compared to either control group, either at the whole-brain level or in regions of interest drawn from prior MBSR studies.

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