Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
August 13, 2007
Norman A. S. Farb, Zindel V. Segal, Helen Mayberg et al.
1,305 citations
Two distinct forms of self-awareness—one linking experiences across time (narrative focus) and one centered on the present moment (experiential focus)—rely on different brain networks and can be dissociated through mindfulness training. In novice participants, focusing on the present reduced activity in cortical midline regions (medial prefrontal cortex) associated with narrative self-reference. In participants who completed an 8-week mindfulness course, present-moment focus produced more extensive reductions in the medial prefrontal cortex and increased engagement of a right-lateralized network including the lateral prefrontal cortex, insula, and somatosensory areas. Functional connectivity showed strong coupling between the right insula and medial prefrontal cortex in novices that was absent in the mindfulness group, indicating attentional training can uncouple these normally integrated forms of self-awareness.
Frontiers in Psychology
June 9, 2015
Norman A. S. Farb, Jennifer Daubenmier, Cynthia Price et al.
630 citations
Interoception, the sense of internal bodily signals, is essential for embodiment, motivation, and well-being but remains poorly understood. This review integrates perspectives from neuroscience, clinical practice, and contemplative studies, introducing an expanded taxonomy of interoceptive processes. It argues that many of these processes can be explained by a predictive coding model of mind-body integration, which describes tension between expected and felt body sensations. This model parallels contemplative theories and links interoception to affective and psychosomatic disorders. Maladaptive interpretation of bodily sensations may underlie many contemporary maladies, and contemplative practices may reduce these biases, restoring a sense of presence and agency.
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
June 11, 2012
Norman A. S. Farb, Zindel V. Segal, Adam K. Anderson
566 citations
Graduates of an 8-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction course, compared to a waitlisted control group, showed changes in brain activity during a task requiring attention to breathing sensations. Functional MRI revealed that mindfulness training predicted greater activity in the anterior insula, a brain region that integrates internal body sensations with external context. The training also predicted reduced activity in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex and altered connectivity between that region and the posterior insula, the primary interoceptive cortex. Greater meditation practice was linked to more posterior insula activity and less reliance on visual brain regions during the task. These results suggest that mindfulness training produces plasticity in brain networks involved in sensing the body's internal state, similar to training-related changes seen in the external senses.
Psychopharmacology
January 2, 2019
Thomas Anderson, Rotem Petranker, Daniel Rosenbaum et al.
171 citations
People who currently or formerly microdosed psychedelics like LSD or psilocybin reported lower dysfunctional attitudes and negative emotionality, and higher wisdom, open-mindedness, and creativity compared to non-microdosers. These differences were observed in an online observational study using self-report questionnaires and a creativity task. The findings suggest potential benefits of microdosing, but controlled experiments are needed to confirm safety and clinical efficacy.
PLoS ONE
September 7, 2022
Geissy Lainny de Lima-Araújo, Geovan Menezes de Sousa, Thatiane Aparecida Mendes et al.
64 citations
A brief three-day mindfulness training increased interoceptive sensibility—the self-reported tendency to notice and attend to body signals—in 40 healthy young adults naive to meditation, compared with an active control group. Five of eight subdomains of interoceptive sensibility improved after the training, but interoceptive accuracy (objective performance on a heartbeat-detection task) did not change. The increase in interoceptive sensibility statistically mediated reductions in state anxiety, suggesting a plausible mechanism for the anxiolytic effects of brief mindfulness practices.
November 1, 2018
Thomas Anderson, Rotem Petranker, Daniel M. Rosenbaum et al.
11 citations
preprint
People who regularly consume small amounts of psychedelics like LSD or psilocybin—a practice called microdosing—report lower levels of dysfunctional attitudes and negative emotionality, and higher levels of wisdom, open-mindedness, and creativity compared to those who do not microdose. This pre-registered study, the first to investigate microdosing and mental health, recruited participants from online forums. Although promising, the findings are preliminary and warrant controlled experimental research to test safety and clinical efficacy. Microdosing may offer clinical benefits without the hallucinogenic effects of full-dose psychedelic therapy.
April 8, 2024
Saampras Ganesan, Aki Tsuchiyagaito, Greg J. Siegle et al.
2 citations
preprint
Meditation practices, which have been adapted into manualized interventions for conditions like depression, pain, addiction, and anxiety, show therapeutic promise, but their neuroscientific basis remains unclear. Current neuroimaging studies rely on small, heterogeneous datasets that vary in practice types, participant experience, clinical targets, and imaging methods, limiting generalizability and replicability. To address this, the ENIGMA-Meditation consortium was formed as a global collaboration to conduct systematic meta- and mega-analyses of distributed neuroimaging data using standardized methods. This framework aims to improve statistical power and rigorously characterize the neural mechanisms underlying meditation's effects on psychological and cognitive attributes, advancing the field of contemplative neuroscience.
November 16, 2025
Zeina Beidas, Anya Ragnhildstveit, Adam Blackman et al.
preprint
A phase II trial will test whether microdosing psilocybin (2 mg weekly) outperforms placebo for major depressive disorder. Forty adults will receive either psilocybin or placebo for four weeks, then all will receive psilocybin for another four weeks. Depression symptoms and other measures will be assessed at baseline, after four weeks, and after eight weeks, with follow-ups for two years. The study aims to clarify whether microdosing has genuine antidepressant effects or whether benefits are due to expectancy, and to inform future dose regimens and the therapeutic role of sub-threshold versus threshold doses.