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In social contexts, the dynamic nature of others' emotions places unique demands on attention and emotion regulation. Mindfulness, characterized by heightened and receptive moment-to-moment attending, may be well-suited to meet these demands. In particular, mindfulness may support more effective cognitive control in social situations via efficient deployment of top-down attention. To test this, a randomized controlled study examined effects of mindfulness training (MT) on behavioral and neural (event-related potentials [ERPs]) responses during an emotional go/no-go task that tested cognitive control in the context of emotional facial expressions that tend to elicit approach or avoidance behavior. Participants (N = 66) were randomly assigned to four brief (20 min) MT sessions or to structurally equivalent book learning control sessions. Relative to the control group, MT led to improved discrimination of facial expressions, as indexed by d-prime, as well as more efficient cognitive control, as indexed by response time and accuracy, and particularly for those evidencing poorer discrimination and cognitive control at baseline. MT also produced better conflict monitoring of behavioral goal-prepotent response tendencies, as indexed by larger No-Go N200 ERP amplitudes, and particularly so for those with smaller No-Go amplitude at baseline. Overall, findings are consistent with MT's potential to enhance deployment of early top-down attention to better meet the unique cognitive and emotional demands of socioemotional contexts, particularly for those with greater opportunity for change. Findings also suggest that early top-down attention deployment could be a cognitive mechanism correspondent to the present-oriented attention commonly used to explain regulatory benefits of mindfulness more broadly.

Social rejection is a distressing and painful event that many people must cope with on a frequent basis. Mindfulness-defined here as a mental state of receptive attentiveness to internal and external stimuli as they arise, moment-to-moment-may buffer such social distress. However, little research indicates whether mindful individuals adaptively regulate the distress of rejection-or the neural mechanisms underlying this potential capacity. To fill these gaps in the literature, participants reported their trait mindfulness and then completed a social rejection paradigm (Cyberball) while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging. Approximately 1 hour after the rejection incident, participants reported their level of distress during rejection (i.e. social distress). Mindfulness was associated with less distress during rejection. This relation was mediated by lower activation in the left ventrolateral prefrontal cortex during the rejection incident, a brain region reliably associated with the inhibition of negative affect. Mindfulness was also correlated with less functional connectivity between the left ventrolateral prefrontal cortex and the bilateral amygdala and the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, which play a critical role in the generation of social distress. Mindfulness may relate to effective coping with rejection by not over-activating top-down regulatory mechanisms, potentially resulting in more effective long-term emotion-regulation.

Mindfulness interventions have garnered significant attention as a complementary health treatment for many physical and psychological conditions. While some research has shown that mindfulness training can decrease psychological and physiological stress responses, it remains unclear whether mindfulness training impacts inflammation—a predictor of poor health outcomes. In addition, little research has examined the active components of mindfulness that may drive health-related improvements. Here, we provide data from two 3-arm randomized controlled trials that examined the effect of mindfulness training on inflammation in stressed community adults. Specifically, we examined whether training individuals to have an accepting attitude towards present moment experiences is a key emotion regulation skill that can lead to decreases in inflammation. Both studies randomly assigned participants to one of three conditions: mindfulness training that taught both attention monitoring and acceptance skills (Monitor+Accept); mindfulness training teaching monitoring without the acceptance component (Monitor Only); or a control condition. Study 1 employed a novel 2-week smartphone-based intervention and Study 2 employed a standard 8-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) intervention. We hypothesized that Monitor+Accept training would lead to reductions in the inflammatory biomarker C-Reactive Protein (CRP) compared to Monitor Only training and control groups. Contrary to this hypothesis, we found that Monitor+Accept mindfulness training did not lead to reductions in CRP. Exploratory analyses combining study subsamples, however, suggest that both mindfulness interventions may reduce CRP in populations at risk for systemic inflammation—midlife-to-older adults and individuals with high BMI. Overall, the present studies contribute significantly to the question of whether mindfulness interventions can reduce systemic markers of low-grade inflammation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Training in mindfulness, classically described as a receptive attentiveness to present events and experiences, has been shown to improve attention and working memory. Both are key to long-term memory formation, and the present three-study series used multiple methods to examine whether mindfulness would enhance episodic memory, a key form of long-term memory. In Study 1 (N = 143), a self-reported state of mindful attention predicted better recognition performance in the Remember-Know (R-K) paradigm. In Study 2 (N = 93), very brief training in a focused attention form of mindfulness also produced better recognition memory performance on the R-K task relative to a randomized, well-matched active control condition. Study 3 (N = 57) extended these findings by showing that relative to randomized active and inactive control conditions the effect of very brief mindfulness training generalized to free-recall memory performance. This study also found evidence for mediation of the mindfulness training—episodic memory relation by intrinsic motivation. These findings indicate that mindful attention can beneficially impact motivation and episodic memory, with potential implications for educational and occupational performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined the role of intensive mindfulness training on changes in day-to-day experiential processing, psychological symptoms, resilience, and well-being in two groups of community adults (N = 69). Using both quasi-experimental and longitudinal methods, the study found that intensive training, operationalized as 10-12 hours of formal mindfulness practice per day for 1 month, was significantly related to increases in training-specific experiential processing capacities, namely trait mindfulness and decentering (reperceiving), in comparison to pre-post-training wait-list controls. In both training groups combined, mindfulness, decentering, and acceptance increased over the pre-training to 1-month follow-up period. Intensive mindfulness training was also related to declines in anxiety and enhanced both subjective well-being and self-compassion from pre-training to follow-up in the two training groups. Finally, increases in trait mindfulness and acceptance were related to improvements in psychological symptoms, well-being, and resilience. Future directions for this novel area of mindfulness research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective Mindfulness interventions, which train practitioners to monitor their present-moment experience with a lens of acceptance , are known to buffer stress reactivity. Little is known about the active mechanisms driving these effects. We theorize that acceptance is a critical emotion regulation mechanism underlying mindfulness stress reduction effects. Method In this three-arm parallel trial, mindfulness components were dismantled into three structurally equivalent 15-lesson smartphone-based interventions: (1) training in both monitoring and acceptance (Monitor + Accept), (2) training in monitoring only (Monitor Only), or (3) active control training (Coping control). 153 stressed adults (mean age = 32 years; 67% female; 53% white, 21.5% black, 21.5% Asian, 4% other race) were randomly assigned to complete one of three interventions. After the intervention, cortisol, blood pressure, and subjective stress reactivity were assessed using a modified Trier Social Stress Test. Results As predicted, Monitor + Accept training reduced cortisol and systolic blood pressure reactivity compared to Monitor Only and control trainings. Participants in all three conditions reported moderate levels of subjective stress. Conclusions This study provides the first experimental evidence that brief smartphone mindfulness training can impact stress biology, and that acceptance training drives these effects. We discuss implications for basic and applied research in contemplative science, emotion regulation, stress and coping, health, and clinical interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]