Ep. 5: Your Mind on Mindfulness
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The billion-dollar industry of mindfulness promises us reductions in anxiety, knowledge of our true selves, and general transcendence... or something. This episode, Beth and Ava look at what the science of mindfulness does and doesn't tell us about the brain, cognition, and even the self.
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Come along for the ride as we breakdown the hype around mindfulness, even venturing into potential dark sides of meditative practices.
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Academic Articles & Books
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***We highly recommend checking out this paper! Problems with mindfulness research: Van Dam, N., van Vugt, M., Vago, D., Schmalzl, L., Saron, C., & Olendzki, A. et al. (2017). Mind the Hype: A Critical Evaluation and Prescriptive Agenda for Research on Mindfulness and Meditation. Perspectives On Psychological Science, 13(1), 36-61. doi: 10.1177/1745691617709589
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Grey matter volumes in memory areas and frontal areas: Luders, E., Toga, A., Lepore, N., & Gaser, C. (2009). The underlying anatomical correlates of long-term meditation: Larger hippocampal and frontal volumes of gray matter. Neuroimage, 45(3), 672-678. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2008.12.061
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Mind wandering can be good: Smallwood, J., & Andrews-Hanna, J. (2013). Not all minds that wander are lost: the importance of a balanced perspective on the mind-wandering state. Frontiers in psychology, 4, 441
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Negative possible symptoms of meditation: Lindahl, J. R., Fisher, N. E., Cooper, D. J., Rosen, R. K., & Britton, W. B. (2017). The varieties of contemplative experience: A mixed-methods study of meditation-related challenges in Western Buddhists. PloS one, 12(5), e0176239.
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Cognition & mindfulness: Gill, L. N., Renault, R., Campbell, E., Rainville, P., & Khoury, B. (2020). Mindfulness induction and cognition: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Consciousness and Cognition, 84, 102991.
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Lighter Reading & Other Resources
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Resources for dealing with aversive effects of meditation and LOTS of info, from Dr. Willoughby Britton: cheetahhouse.org
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Meditation pulled from TEDx by Jo Pang