There has been considerable research and enthusiasm for investigating how contemplative training might improve social relationships. However, contemplative training is necessarily embedded in a network of social relationships, and researchers have not sufficiently studied the impact of one’s relationships on contemplative practice and development. Furthermore, contemplative training in the modern world is increasingly focused on …
Continue reading “Assessing beneficial relationship factors that support contemplative development”
Cultivation of mindfulness, the nonjudgmental awareness of experiences in the present moment, produces profound beneficial effects on well-being. However, whether and how mindful presence affects one of the most fundamental fields of human prosperity – interpersonal relationships – is largely unknown. Relying on recent methodological advancements in research of interactions, the current proposal aims to …
Continue reading “Studying interpersonal physiological attunement in experienced mindfulness practitioners”
Decisions from Mexican employees from the public sector have enormous impact on Mexican society. Government employees experience great levels of stress and many times they don’t have tools to deal with conflictive situations and decisions at work. As a means to promote well-being and secular ethics in government employees that may impact their productivity and …
Continue reading “Assessing the effect of contemplative-based training in self awareness, self-regulation, prosocial attitudes and ethical decision making in employees of private or public organizations in Mexico”
The proposed research will investigate the role of mindfulness in mother-infant relationships and how this impacts biological aging. Telomeres, the repeated nucleotide sequences at the end of chromosomes, protect chromosomes from deterioration and enable cellular integrity. Age, relational stress, and inflammation degrade telomeres, which in turn is thought to relate to a range of health …
Continue reading “Impacts of maternal mindfulness on mother-infant biological integrity”
While there is some initial indication that mindfulness meditation interventions can improve social relationship functioning outcomes, this work has not been well controlled and we know little about how mindfulness interventions improve social relationships. We conducted an active treatment controlled 3-arm trial of mindfulness meditation training programs in a stressed community sample (N=153), using a …
Continue reading “Using mindfulness meditation training to transform social relationships among lonely older adults: A randomized controlled trial”
In this experimental intervention, 121 adults participated in a randomized control trial testing whether daily reflection on social and nonsocial aspects of wellbeing is beneficial for mental and physical health. Every day for seven weeks, participants randomly assigned to the social wellbeing condition were asked to reflect on daily social interactions and rate how close …
Continue reading “How do thoughts about social closeness promote health and well-being?”
Having close social connections powerfully predicts well-being and longevity (Holt-Lunstad, Smith, & Layton, 2010). Our study examined whether taking a 6-week mindfulness meditation training would lead to gains in perceived social connection from pre to post training, compared to an active-control wellness training group. We also examined possible cognitive and emotional mechanisms of this hypothesized …
Continue reading “Mindfulness in interpersonal judgments and relationships in daily life”
As Compassion meditation specifically fosters positive feelings such as equanimity, joy, and compassion towards others, it may be ideally suited to reduce the stress and negative emotions related to stressful encounters. Pilot data for a neuroimaging dataset obtained with a prior Varela Award shows that Compassion training, more than Relaxation training, increased positive ratings of …
Continue reading “Short and long-term behavioral, physiological, and brain changes resulting from compassion meditation training as an intervention for stress due to difficult interpersonal relationships”
This project examined the extent to which meditation can promote compassion and well-being, even in the face of conflict. Specifically, we examined whether compassion and mindfulness training can produce compassionate tendencies that act as an enduring inoculation against the negative effects of anger, using measures of subjective experience (e.g., anger, compassion, well-being) in daily life …
Continue reading “Contemplative practice, emotional well-being, and the transformation of hostility in the lab and real world”
This pilot randomized control trial (RCT) addressed the design and evaluation of a trauma-informed adaptation of Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (TI-MBSR) as a trauma-informed intervention for women who identified themselves as survivors of interpersonal violence and felt that these past experience still negatively affected them currently. A mixed methods approach included using quantitative measures to …
Continue reading “Trauma-Informed Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction to promote intra- and interpersonal flourishing among survivors of traumatic violence”
