It is unclear exactly why, or when, compassion-eliciting situations evoke responses that are pleasant and productive, versus aversive and potentially detrimental to one’s health. The proposed work seeks to clarify the role of mindset on the experience of compassion-eliciting situations, helping behavior, and responses to unrelated stressors. Specifically, I propose the action-phase model of compassion, …
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The impact of a mindfulness-based intervention on opioid misuse during pregnancy: A mixed methods pilot RCT
Opioid pain medication use during pregnancy is a growing concern in the United States. This study will explore the effects of a mindfulness-based intervention, Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement (MORE), on opioid misuse, opioid craving, and parenting behavior among pregnant women using opioids. MORE has been found to decrease automatic attention to opioids, increase emotion regulation, and …
Investigating the impact of yoga on brain aging: A randomized controlled trial
With the aging global population, dementia is becoming an increasing concern for global public health. Currently, some evidence suggests that meditation and yoga practice may help decrease risk for dementia and cognitive decline. Furthermore, these interventions have the strengths of being inexpensive and scalable, while also being helpful for brain aging as well as general …
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Mindfulness-based intervention to examine yearning and grief specific rumination as mediators of grief outcomes in bereaved individuals
Bereavement is one of the most common and stressful human experiences, affecting nearly 8 million people per year in the United States. Following loss, yearning and rumination are repetitive thought processes that increase the risk for poor grief outcomes. Mindfulness Meditation (MM) training has been found to reduce unhelpful repetitive thought processes. However, research on …
Mindfulness Intervention to Study the Neurobiology of Depression (MIND)
Mindfulness was taught to teenagers with a history of depression as one strategy for being aware of maladaptive thinking patterns such as rumination. Mindfulness was also taught as an alternative to “getting stuck in your head”. Teenagers who received 8 weeks of this intervention, experienced a reduction in residual depression symptoms compared to teenagers who …
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Mindfulness and beyond: A qualitative study of advanced Mahasi meditators’ experience
The recent convergence of Asian and Western culture has generated interest in meditation as a practice and clinical intervention. The Burmese Mahasi style of vipassana meditation, in particular, has been a wellspring from which mindfulness-based treatment protocols have been derived. And while these clinical interventions have proven efficacious in treating a wide range of psychological …
The effects of contemplative training on brain structure and function in 6-year-old children
A Parent-Child Mindfulness Based Training (PC-MBT) program was developed to examine whether children who learned strategies of emotion regulation and self-compassion prior to completing a working memory training program would show greater subsequent gains in memory capacity. A secondary aim was to determine whether measures of brain structure and function would reflect training-related changes in …
Self-compassion and the need of self-preservation
Terror management theory research suggests that self-esteem acts as an anxiety buffer and high self-esteem can reduce implicit death thoughts and worldview defense. Our research investigated self-compassion that enhances wellbeing by making people feel safe and secure, whereas self-esteem makes people feel superior and sometimes unrealistically self-confident. Results in our series of studies failed to …
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The varieties of contemplative experience
Meditation practices and interventions, derived from contemplative religious traditions, have become increasingly popular in clinical, educational and scientific research contexts. Meditation is being applied to the treatment of a wide range of psychiatric conditions, from depression to psychosis, and implemented in schools, businesses and prisons to promote performance and wellbeing and decrease stress and anxiety. …
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Effects of yogic breathing on sleep and well-being in college students: Exploration of psychophysiological mechanisms
Insomnia is a prevalent health concern in older adults with numerous adverse consequences. Prior research suggests that the sleep disturbance and related complaints are driven by physiological hyperarousal and deficiencies in the autonomic nervous system, particularly parasympathetic activity, that inhibit healthy sleep-wake regulation. Pharmacological treatments are not viable long-term, and current behavioral and contemplative interventions …
