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  Taking time to feel our body: Steady increases in heartbeat perception accuracy and decreases in alexithymia over 9 months of contemplative mental training

Bornemann, B., & Singer, T. (2017). Taking time to feel our body: Steady increases in heartbeat perception accuracy and decreases in alexithymia over 9 months of contemplative mental training. Psychophysiology, 54(3), 469-482. doi:10.1111/psyp.12790.

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 Creators:
Bornemann, Boris1, Author           
Singer, Tania1, Author           
Affiliations:
1Department Social Neuroscience, MPI for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Max Planck Society, ou_634552              

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Free keywords: Interoception ; Body awareness ; Meditation ; Mindfulness ; Contemplative training ; Emotional awareness ; Alexithymia
 Abstract: The ability to accurately perceive signals from the body has been shown to be important for physical and psychological health as well as understanding one's emotions. Despite the importance of this skill, often indexed by heartbeat perception accuracy (HBPa), little is known about its malleability. Here, we investigated whether contemplative mental practice can increase HBPa. In the context of a 9‐month mental training study, the ReSource Project, two matched cohorts (n = 77 and n = 79) underwent three training modules of 3 months' duration that targeted attentional and interoceptive abilities (Presence module), socio‐affective (Affect module), and socio‐cognitive (Perspective module) abilities. A third cohort (n = 78) underwent 3 months of practice (Affect module) and a retest control group (n = 84) did not undergo any training. HBPa was measured with a heartbeat tracking task before and after each training module. Emotional awareness was measured by the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS). Participants with TAS scores > 60 at screening were excluded. HBPa was found to increase steadily over the training, with significant and small‐ to medium‐sized effects emerging after 6 months (Cohen's d = .173) and 9 months (d = .273) of mental training. Changes in HBPa were concomitant with and predictive of changes in emotional awareness. Our results suggest that HBPa can indeed be trained through intensive contemplative practice. The effect takes longer than the 8 weeks of typical mindfulness courses to reach meaningful magnitude. These increments in interoceptive accuracy and the related improvements in emotional awareness point to opportunities for improving physical and psychological health through contemplative mental training.

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Language(s): eng - English
 Dates: 2016-03-102016-10-012016-12-072017-03
 Publication Status: Issued
 Pages: -
 Publishing info: -
 Table of Contents: -
 Rev. Type: Peer
 Identifiers: DOI: 10.1111/psyp.12790
PMID: 27925645
Other: Epub 2016
 Degree: -

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Funding organization : Max Planck Society
Project name : Plasticity of the Empathic Brain: Structural and Functional MRI Studies on the Effect of Empathy Training on the Human Brain and Prosocial Behaviour / EMPATHICBRAIN
Grant ID : 205557
Funding program : Funding Programme 7
Funding organization : European Commission (EC)

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Title: Psychophysiology
Source Genre: Journal
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Publ. Info: -
Pages: - Volume / Issue: 54 (3) Sequence Number: - Start / End Page: 469 - 482 Identifier: ISSN: 0048-5772
CoNE: https://pure.mpg.de/cone/journals/resource/954925334698