Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Volume 104, Issue 27, Pages 11483-11488Publisher
NATL ACAD SCIENCES
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0606552104
Keywords
attention; frontal; parietal; response inhibition
Categories
Funding
- NCCIH NIH HHS [U01AT002114-01A1, U01 AT002114] Funding Source: Medline
- NIMH NIH HHS [P50 MH069315] Funding Source: Medline
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Meditation refers to a family of mental training practices that are designed to familiarize the practitioner with specific types of mental processes. One of the most basic forms of meditation is concentration meditation, in which sustained attention is focused on an object such as a small visual stimulus or the breath. In age-matched participants, using functional MRI, we found that activation in a network of brain regions typically involved in sustained attention showed an inverted U-shaped curve in which expert meditators (EMs) with an average of 19,000 In of practice had more activation than novices, but EMs with an average of 44,000 In had less activation. In response to distracter sounds used to probe the meditation, EMs vs. novices had less brain activation in regions related to discursive thoughts and emotions and more activation in regions related to response inhibition and attention. Correlation with hours of practice suggests possible plasticity in these mechanisms.
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