Centre de Recherche en Neuropsychologie et Cognition (CERNEC), Département de Psychologie, Université de Montréal, Montréal, Québec, Canada.
Neuroimage. 2011 Aug 15;57(4):1524-33. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.06.001. Epub 2011 Jun 12.
There is mounting evidence that mindfulness meditation is beneficial for the treatment of mood and anxiety disorders, yet little is known regarding the neural mechanisms through which mindfulness modulates emotional responses. Thus, a central objective of this functional magnetic resonance imaging study was to investigate the effects of mindfulness on the neural responses to emotionally laden stimuli. Another major goal of this study was to examine the impact of the extent of mindfulness training on the brain mechanisms supporting the processing of emotional stimuli. Twelve experienced (with over 1000 h of practice) and 10 beginner meditators were scanned as they viewed negative, positive, and neutral pictures in a mindful state and a non-mindful state of awareness. Results indicated that the Mindful condition attenuated emotional intensity perceived from pictures, while brain imaging data suggested that this effect was achieved through distinct neural mechanisms for each group of participants. For experienced meditators compared with beginners, mindfulness induced a deactivation of default mode network areas (medial prefrontal and posterior cingulate cortices) across all valence categories and did not influence responses in brain regions involved in emotional reactivity during emotional processing. On the other hand, for beginners relative to experienced meditators, mindfulness induced a down-regulation of the left amygdala during emotional processing. These findings suggest that the long-term practice of mindfulness leads to emotional stability by promoting acceptance of emotional states and enhanced present-moment awareness, rather than by eliciting control over low-level affective cerebral systems from higher-order cortical brain regions. These results have implications for affect-related psychological disorders.
越来越多的证据表明正念冥想有益于治疗情绪和焦虑障碍，但对于正念如何调节情绪反应的神经机制知之甚少。因此，这项功能磁共振成像研究的一个主要目标是调查正念对情绪刺激神经反应的影响。这项研究的另一个主要目标是研究正念训练程度对支持情绪刺激处理的大脑机制的影响。12 名有经验的（超过 1000 小时的练习）和 10 名初学者冥想者在正念状态和非正念状态下观看负面、正面和中性图片时进行了扫描。结果表明，在正念状态下，参与者感知到的情绪强度会减弱，而大脑成像数据表明，这一效果是通过两组参与者不同的神经机制实现的。与初学者相比，有经验的冥想者在所有情绪类别中都会使默认模式网络区域（内侧前额叶和后扣带回皮质）失活，而不会影响情绪处理过程中涉及情绪反应的大脑区域的反应。另一方面，与有经验的冥想者相比，初学者在情绪处理过程中，左杏仁核的活动会降低。这些发现表明，长期的正念练习通过促进对情绪状态的接受和增强当下意识，而不是通过从高级皮质大脑区域对低级情感大脑系统进行控制，从而导致情绪稳定。这些结果对与情感相关的心理障碍具有启示意义。
