Mind–body interventions such as mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) may improve well-being by increasing awareness and regulation of physiological and cognitive states. However, it is unclear how practice may alter long-term, baseline physiological processes, and whether these changes reflect improved well-being. Using respiration rate (RR), which can be sensitive to effects of meditation, and 3 aspects of self-reported well-being (psychological well-being [PWB], distress, and medical symptoms), we tested pre-registered hypotheses that: (1) Lower baseline RR (in a resting, non-meditative state) would be a physiological marker associated with well-being, (2) MBSR would decrease RR, and (3) Training-related decreases in RR would be associated with improved well-being. We recruited 245 adults (age range = 18–65, M = 42.4): experienced meditators (n = 42), and meditation-naïve participants randomized to MBSR (n = 72), active control (n = 41), or waitlist control (n = 66). Data were collected at pre-randomization, post-intervention (or waiting), and long-term follow-up. Lower baseline RR was associated with lower psychological distress among long-term meditators (p* = 0.03, b = 0.02, 95% CI [0.01, 0.03]), though not in non-meditators prior to training. MBSR decreased RR compared to waitlist (p = 0.02, Cohen’s d = − 0.41, 95% CI [− 0.78, − 0.06]), but not the active control. Decreased RR related to decreased medical symptoms, across all participants (p* = 0.02, b = 0.57, 95% CI [0.15, 0.98]). Post-training, lower RR was associated with higher PWB across training groups compared to waitlist (p* = 0.01, b = 0.06, 95% CI [0.02, 0.10]), though there were no significant differences in change in PWB between groups. This physiological marker may indicate higher physical and/or psychological well-being in those who engage in wellness practices.

Trait mindfulness refers to one's disposition or tendency to pay attention to their experiences in the present moment, in a non-judgmental and accepting way. Trait mindfulness has been robustly associated with positive mental health outcomes, but its neural underpinnings are poorly understood. Prior resting-state fMRI studies have associated trait mindfulness with within- and between-network connectivity of the default-mode (DMN), fronto-parietal (FPN), and salience networks. However, it is unclear how generalizable the findings are, how they relate to different components of trait mindfulness, and how other networks and brain areas may be involved. To address these gaps, we conducted the largest resting-state fMRI study of trait mindfulness to-date, consisting of a pre-registered connectome-based predictive modeling analysis in 367 meditation-naïve adults across three samples collected at different sites. In the model-training dataset, we did not find connections that predicted overall trait mindfulness, but we identified neural models of two mindfulness subscales, Acting with Awareness and Non-judging. Models included both positive networks (sets of pairwise connections that positively predicted mindfulness with increasing connectivity) and negative networks, which showed the inverse relationship. The Acting with Awareness and Non-judging positive network models showed distinct network representations involving FPN and DMN, respectively. The negative network models, which overlapped significantly across subscales, involved connections across the whole brain with prominent involvement of somatomotor, visual and DMN networks. Only the negative networks generalized to predict subscale scores out-of-sample, and not across both test datasets. Predictions from both models were also negatively correlated with predictions from a well-established mind-wandering connectome model. We present preliminary neural evidence for a generalizable connectivity models of trait mindfulness based on specific affective and cognitive facets. However, the incomplete generalization of the models across all sites and scanners, limited stability of the models, as well as the substantial overlap between the models, underscores the difficulty of finding robust brain markers of mindfulness facets.

We developed a self-report measure of psychological well-being for teens and adults, the Healthy Minds Index, based on a novel theory that four trainable pillars underlie well-being: awareness, connection, insight, and purpose. Ninety-seven items were developed and revised by experts and guided by qualitative testing with teens (n = 32; average age = 16.0 years). After assessing the internal validity and factor structure in teens (n = 1607; average age = 16.7 years) and adults (n = 420; average age = 45.6 years), we reduced the survey to 17 items. We then validated the factor structure, internal and convergent and divergent validity, and retest reliability of the 17-item Healthy Minds Index in two new teen samples (study 1: n = 1492, average age = 15.7 years; study 2: n = 295, average age = 16.1 years), and one adult sample (n = 285; average age = 45.3 years). The Healthy Minds Index demonstrated adequate validity and provided a comprehensive measure of a novel theory of psychological well-being that includes two domains not found in other conceptualizations of this construct—awareness and insight. This measure will be invaluable for primary research on well-being and as a translational tool to assess the impact and efficacy of widely used behavioral training programs on these core dimensions of wellbeing.

Background: The staggering morbidity associated with chronic inflammatory diseases can be reduced by psychological interventions, including Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR). Proposed mechanisms for MBSR's beneficial effects include changes in salience network function. Salience network perturbations are also associated with chronic inflammation, including airway inflammation in asthma, a chronic inflammatory disease affecting approximately 10% of the population. However, no studies have examined whether MBSR-related improvements in disease control are related to changes in salience network function.Methods: Adults with asthma were randomized to 8 weeks of MBSR or a waitlist control group. Resting state functional connectivity was measured using fMRI before randomization, immediately post-intervention, and 4 months post-intervention. Using key salience network regions as seeds, we calculated group differences in change in functional connectivity over time and examined whether functional connectivity changes were associated with increased mindfulness, improved asthma control, and decreased inflammatory biomarkers.Results: The MBSR group showed greater increases in functional connectivity between salience network regions relative to the waitlist group. Improvements in asthma control correlated with increased functional connectivity between the salience network and regions important for attention control and emotion regulation. Improvements in inflammatory biomarkers were related to decreased functional connectivity between the salience network and other networks.Conclusions: Increased resting salience network coherence and connectivity with networks that subserve attention and emotion regulation may contribute to the benefits of MBSR for patients with asthma. Understanding the neural underpinnings of MBSR-related benefits in patients is a critical step towards optimizing brain targeted interventions for chronic inflammatory disease management.

Mindfulness meditation has been shown to increase resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) between the posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), which is thought to reflect improvements in shifting attention to the present moment. However, prior research in long-term meditation practitioners lacked quantitative measures of attention that would provide a more direct behavioral correlate and interpretational anchor for PCC-DLPFC connectivity and was inherently limited by small sample sizes. Moreover, whether mindfulness meditation primarily impacts brain function locally, or impacts the dynamics of large-scale brain networks, remained unclear. Here, we sought to replicate and extend prior findings of increased PCC-DLPFC rsFC in a sample of 40 long-term meditators (average practice = 3759 hr) who also completed a behavioral assay of attention. In addition, we tested a network-based framework of changes in interregional connectivity by examining network-level connectivity. We found that meditators had stronger PCC-rostrolateral prefrontal cortex (RLPFC) rsFC, lower connector hub strength across the default mode network, and better subjective attention, compared with 124 meditation-naive controls. Orienting attention positively correlated with PCC-RLPFC connectivity and negatively correlated with default mode network connector hub strength. These findings provide novel evidence that PCC-RLPFC rsFC may support attention orienting, consistent with a role for RLPFC in the attention shifting component of metacognitive awareness that is a core component of mindfulness meditation training. Our results further demonstrate that long-term mindfulness meditation may improve attention and strengthen the underlying brain networks.

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-naïve 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.

Mindfulness training has been shown to improve attention and change the underlying brain substrates in adults. Most mindfulness training programs involve a myriad of techniques, and it is difficult to attribute changes to any particular aspect of the program. Here, we created a video game, Tenacity, which models a specific mindfulness technique – focused attention on one’s breathing – and assessed its potential to train an attentional network in adolescents. A combined analysis of resting state functional connectivity (rs-FC) and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) yielded convergent results – change in communication within the left fronto-parietal network after two weeks of playing Tenacity compared to a control game. Rs-FC analysis showed greater connectivity between left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) and left inferior parietal cortex (IPC) in the Tenacity group. Importantly, changes in left dlPFC – IPC rs-FC and changes in structural connectivity of the white matter tract that connects these regions –left superior longitudinal fasiculus (SLF) – were associated with changes in performance on an attention task. Finally, changes in left dlPFC – IPC rs-FC correlated with the change in left SLF structural connectivity as measured by fractional anisotropy (FA) in the Tenacity group only.

Interest has grown in using mindfulness meditation to treat conditions featuring excessive impulsivity. However, while prior studies find that mindfulness practice can improve attention, it remains unclear whether it improves other cognitive faculties whose deficiency can contribute to impulsivity. Here, an eight-week mindfulness intervention did not reduce impulsivity on the go/no-go task or Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS-11), nor produce changes in neural correlates of impulsivity (i.e. frontostriatal gray matter, functional connectivity, and dopamine levels) compared to active or wait-list control groups. Separately, long-term meditators (LTMs) did not perform differently than meditation-naïve participants (MNPs) on the go/no-go task. However, LTMs self-reported lower attentional impulsivity, but higher motor and non-planning impulsivity on the BIS-11 than MNPs. LTMs had less striatal gray matter, greater cortico-striatal-thalamic functional connectivity, and lower spontaneous eye-blink rate (a physiological dopamine indicator) than MNPs. LTM total lifetime practice hours (TLPH) did not significantly relate to impulsivity or neurobiological metrics. Findings suggest that neither short- nor long-term mindfulness practice may be effective for redressing impulsive behavior derived from inhibitory motor control or planning capacity deficits in healthy adults. Given the absence of TLPH relationships to impulsivity or neurobiological metrics, differences between LTMs and MNPs may be attributable to pre-existing differences.

Mindfulness meditation training has been shown to increase resting-state functional connectivity between nodes of the frontoparietal executive control network (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex [DLPFC]) and the default mode network (posterior cingulate cortex [PCC]). We investigated whether these effects generalized to a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) course and tested for structural and behaviorally relevant consequences of change in connectivity. Healthy, meditation-naive adults were randomized to either MBSR (N = 48), an active (N = 47) or waitlist (N = 45) control group. Participants completed behavioral testing, resting-state fMRI scans and diffusion tensor scans at pre-randomization (T1), post-intervention (T2) and similar to 5.5 months later (T3). We found increased T2-T1 PCC-DLPFC resting connectivity for MBSR relative to control groups. Although these effects did not persist through long-term follow-up (T3-T1), MBSR participants showed a significantly stronger relationship between days of practice (T1 to T3) and increased PCC-DLPFC resting connectivity than participants in the active control group. Increased PCC-DLPFC resting connectivity in MBSR participants was associated with increased microstructural connectivity of a white matter tract connecting these regions and increased self-reported attention. These data show that MBSR increases PCC-DLPFC resting connectivity, which is related to increased practice time, attention and structural connectivity.

Abstract While rodent research suggests that the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST) and centromedial amygdala (CM) coordinate the hormonal stress response, little is known about the BNST’s role in the human stress response. The human BNST responds to negatively valenced stimuli, which likely subserves its role in responding to threat. Thus, variation in BNST reactivity to negatively valenced stimuli may relate to differences in the stress response. We measured participants’ blood oxygenated level-dependent response to affective images and salivary cortisol and α-amylase (AA) levels in response to a subsequent Trier social stress test (TSST). Greater BNST activation to emotionally evocative images was associated with a larger TSST-evoked AA, but not cortisol response. This association remained after controlling for CM activation, which was not related to the cortisol or AA response. These results suggest that the BNST response to negatively valenced images subserves its role in coordinating the stress response, a BNST role in the stress response independent from the CM, and highlight the need for investigation of the conditions under which BNST activation predicts the cortisol response. Our findings are critical for the future study of mood and anxiety disorders, as dysregulation of the stress system plays a key role in their pathogenesis.

Mindfulness meditation is increasingly incorporated into mental health interventions, and theoretical concepts associated with it have influenced basic research on psychopathology. Here, we review the current understanding of mindfulness meditation through the lens of clinical neuroscience, outlining the core capacities targeted by mindfulness meditation and mapping them onto cognitive and affective constructs of the Research Domain Criteria matrix proposed by the National Institute of Mental Health. We review efficacious applications of mindfulness meditation to specific domains of psychopathology including depression, anxiety, chronic pain, and substance abuse, as well as emerging efforts related to attention disorders, traumatic stress, dysregulated eating, and serious mental illness. Priorities for future research include pinpointing mechanisms, refining methodology, and improving implementation. Mindfulness meditation is a promising basis for interventions, with particular potential relevance to psychiatric comorbidity. The successes and challenges of mindfulness meditation research are instructive for broader interactions between contemplative traditions and clinical psychological science.

Meditation training can improve mood and emotion regulation, yet the neural mechanisms of these affective changes have yet to be fully elucidated. We evaluated the impact of long- and short-term mindfulness meditation training on the amygdala response to emotional pictures in a healthy, non-clinical population of adults using blood-oxygen level dependent functional magnetic resonance imaging. Long-term meditators (N = 30, 16 female) had 9081 h of lifetime practice on average, primarily in mindfulness meditation. Short-term training consisted of an 8-week Mindfulness- Based Stress Reduction course (N = 32, 22 female), which was compared to an active control condition (N = 35, 19 female) in a randomized controlled trial. Meditation training was associated with less amygdala reactivity to positive pictures relative to controls, but there were no group differences in response to negative pictures. Reductions in reactivity to negative stimuli may require more practice experience or concentrated practice, as hours of retreat practice in long-term meditators was associated with lower amygdala reactivity to negative pictures - yet we did not see this relationship for practice time with MBSR. Short-term training, compared to the control intervention, also led to increased functional connectivity between the amygdala and a region implicated in emotion regulation - ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC) - during affective pictures. Thus, meditation training may improve affective responding through reduced amygdala reactivity, and heightened amygdala-VMPFC connectivity during affective stimuli may reflect a potential mechanism by which MBSR exerts salutary effects on emotion regulation ability.

The ability to understand emotional experiences of others, empathy, is a valuable skill for effective social interactions. Various types of training increase empathy in adolescents, but their impact on brain circuits underlying empathy has not been examined. Video games provide a unique medium familiar and engaging to adolescents and can be used to deliver training at scale. We developed an empathy training video game, Crystals of Kaydor (Crystals), and investigated whether playing Crystals increases empathic accuracy (EA) and related brain activation in adolescents (N = 74; 27 female; mean age(sd) = 12.8(0.7) years; age range 11-14 years). Participants completed a resting state functional MRI (rs-fMRI) scan and an EA task during an fMRI scan before and after 2 weeks of daily gameplay with either the empathy training game, Crystals (N = 34), or the commercial video game Bastion (N = 40), an active control condition. There were no group differences in EA improvement following gameplay, however, engagement with training aspects of Crystals was associated with a higher increase in EA-related activation in right temporoparietal junction following gameplay. Moreover, rs-fMRI connectivity in empathy-related brain circuits (posterior cingulate-medial prefrontal cortex; MPFC) was stronger after Crystals gameplay compared to Bastion. The more individuals' EA increased following Crystals versus Bastion, the stronger their rs-fMRI connectivity in brain circuits relevant for emotion regulation (amygdala-MPFC). These findings suggest that a video game designed to increase empathic accuracy produces behaviorally-relevant, functional neural changes in fewer than 6 h of gameplay in adolescents.

Studies consistently implicate aberrance of the brain's reward-processing and decision-making networks in disorders featuring high levels of impulsivity, such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, substance use disorder, and psychopathy. However, less is known about the neurobiological determinants of individual differences in impulsivity in the general population. In this study of 105 healthy adults, we examined relationships between impulsivity and three neurobiological metrics – gray matter volume, resting-state functional connectivity, and spontaneous eye-blink rate, a physiological indicator of central dopaminergic activity. Impulsivity was measured both by performance on a task of behavioral inhibition (go/no-go task) and by self-ratings of attentional, motor, and non-planning impulsivity using the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS11). Overall, we found that less gray matter in medial orbitofrontal cortex and paracingulate gyrus, greater resting-state functional connectivity between nodes of the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical network, and lower spontaneous eye-blink rate were associated with greater impulsivity. Specifically, less prefrontal gray matter was associated with higher BIS-11 motor and non-planning impulsivity scores, but was not related to task performance; greater correlated resting-state functional connectivity between the basal ganglia and thalamus, motor cortices, and prefrontal cortex was associated with worse no-go trial accuracy on the task and with higher BIS-11 motor impulsivity scores; lower spontaneous eye-blink rate was associated with worse no-go trial accuracy and with higher BIS-11 motor impulsivity scores. These data provide evidence that individual differences in impulsivity in the general population are related to variability in multiple neurobiological metrics in the brain's reward-processing and decision-making networks.

Studies consistently implicate aberrance of the brain's reward-processing and decision-making networks in disorders featuring high levels of impulsivity, such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, substance use disorder, and psychopathy. However, less is known about the neurobiological determinants of individual differences in impulsivity in the general population. In this study of 105 healthy adults, we examined relationships between impulsivity and three neurobiological metrics – gray matter volume, resting-state functional connectivity, and spontaneous eye-blink rate, a physiological indicator of central dopaminergic activity. Impulsivity was measured both by performance on a task of behavioral inhibition (go/no-go task) and by self-ratings of attentional, motor, and non-planning impulsivity using the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS-11). Overall, we found that less gray matter in medial orbitofrontal cortex and paracingulate gyrus, greater resting-state functional connectivity between nodes of the basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical network, and lower spontaneous eye-blink rate were associated with greater impulsivity. Specifically, less prefrontal gray matter was associated with higher BIS-11 motor and non-planning impulsivity scores, but was not related to task performance; greater correlated resting-state functional connectivity between the basal ganglia and thalamus, motor cortices, and prefrontal cortex was associated with worse no-go trial accuracy on the task and with higher BIS-11 motor impulsivity scores; lower spontaneous eye-blink rate was associated with worse no-go trial accuracy and with higher BIS-11 motor impulsivity scores. These data provide evidence that individual differences in impulsivity in the general population are related to variability in multiple neurobiological metrics in the brain's reward-processing and decision-making networks.

Abstract Empathy, the ability to understand others’ emotions, can occur through perspective taking and experience sharing. Neural systems active when adults empathize include regions underlying perspective taking (e.g. medial prefrontal cortex; MPFC) and experience sharing (e.g. inferior parietal lobule; IPL). It is unknown whether adolescents utilize networks implicated in both experience sharing and perspective taking when accurately empathizing. This question is critical given the importance of accurately understanding others’ emotions for developing and maintaining adaptive peer relationships during adolescence. We extend the literature on empathy in adolescence by determining the neural basis of empathic accuracy, a behavioral assay of empathy that does not bias participants toward the exclusive use of perspective taking or experience sharing. Participants (N = 155, aged 11.1–15.5 years) watched videos of ‘targets’ describing emotional events and continuously rated the targets’ emotions during functional magnetic resonance imaging scanning. Empathic accuracy related to activation in regions underlying perspective taking (MPFC, temporoparietal junction and superior temporal sulcus), while activation in regions underlying experience sharing (IPL, anterior cingulate cortex and anterior insula) related to lower empathic accuracy. These results provide novel insight into the neural basis of empathic accuracy in adolescence and suggest that perspective taking processes may be effective for increasing empathy.

An individual's affective style is influenced by many things, including the manner in which an individual responds to an emotional challenge. Emotional response is composed of a number of factors, two of which are the initial reactivity to an emotional stimulus and the subsequent recovery once the stimulus terminates or ceases to be relevant. However, most neuroimaging studies examining emotional processing in humans focus on the magnitude of initial reactivity to a stimulus rather than the prolonged response. In this study, we use functional magnetic resonance imaging to study the time course of amygdala activity in healthy adults in response to presentation of negative images. We split the amygdala time course into an initial reactivity period and a recovery period beginning after the offset of the stimulus. We find that initial reactivity in the amygdala does not predict trait measures of affective style. Conversely, amygdala recovery shows predictive power such that slower amygdala recovery from negative images predicts greater trait neuroticism, in addition to lower levels of likability of a set of social stimuli (neutral faces). These data underscore the importance of taking into account temporal dynamics when studying affective processing using neuroimaging.

Context: Emotion regulation deficits figure prominently in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and in other anxiety and mood disorders. Research examining emotion regulation and top-down modulation has implicated reduced coupling of the amygdala with prefrontal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex, suggesting altered frontolimbic white matter connectivity in GAD.Objectives: To investigate structural connectivity between ventral prefrontal cortex or anterior cingulate cortex areas and the amygdala in GAD and to assess associations with functional connectivity between those areas.Design: Participants underwent diffusion-tensor imaging and functional magnetic resonance imaging.Setting: University magnetic resonance imaging facility.Participants: Forty-nine patients with GAD and 39 healthy volunteer control subjects, including a matched subset of 21 patients having GAD without comorbid Axis I diagnoses and 21 healthy volunteers matched for age, sex, and education.Main Outcome Measures: The mean fractional anisotropy values in the left and right uncinate fasciculus, as measured by tract-based analysis for diffusion-tensor imaging data.Results: Lower mean fractional anisotropy values in the bilateral uncinate fasciculus indicated reduced frontolimbic structural connectivity in patients with GAD. This reduction in uncinate fasciculus integrity was most pronounced for patients without comorbidity and was not observed in other white matter tracts. Across all participants, higher fractional anisotropy values were associated with more negative functional coupling between the pregenual anterior cingulate cortex and the amygdala during the anticipation of aversion.Conclusions: Reduced structural connectivity of a major frontolimbic pathway suggests a neural basis for emotion regulation deficits in GAD. The functional significance of these structural differences is underscored by decreased functional connectivity between the anterior cingulate cortex and the amygdala in individuals with reduced structural integrity of the uncinate fasciculus.

Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) patients exhibit heightened anticipatory amygdala activity before presentations of affective pictures (Nitschke et al., 2009). Worrying (experienced chronically in GAD) is a future-oriented thought process (Borkovec, 2002) that may similarly reflect anticipatory anxiety in GAD. GAD severity, indexed by the GAD-Q (Newman et al., 2002) might also overlap significantly with anticipatory anxiety indexed by amygdala activity during the anticipation of aversion.