Laureate Institute for Brain Research, Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Oxley College of Health Sciences, University of Tulsa, Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Psychophysiology. 2020 Feb;57(2):e13479. doi: 10.1111/psyp.13479. Epub 2019 Oct 1.
Meditation is commonly assumed to be associated with enhanced interoceptive accuracy. We previously found that experienced meditators did not exhibit a greater ability than nonmeditators to detect heartbeat sensations at rest, despite the meditators' reported subjective ratings of higher accuracy and lower difficulty. Here, attempting to overcome previous methodological limitations, we assessed interoceptive awareness of heartbeat and breathing sensations across physiological arousal levels using infusions of isoproterenol, a beta-adrenergic agonist similar to adrenaline. We hypothesized that meditators would display greater interoceptive awareness than nonmeditators, as evidenced by higher interoceptive detection rates, increased interoceptive accuracy, and differences in localization of heartbeat sensations. We studied 15 meditators and 15 nonmeditators, individually matched on age, gender, and body mass index, using randomized, double-blinded, and placebo-controlled bolus infusions of isoproterenol. Participants reported their experience of heartbeat and breathing sensations using a dial during infusions and the location of heartbeat sensations on a two-dimensional manikin afterward. There was no evidence of higher detection rates or increased accuracy across any dose, although meditators showed a tendency to report cardiorespiratory sensation changes sooner at higher doses. Relative to nonmeditators, meditators exhibited prominent geographical differences in heartbeat localization, disproportionally reporting sensations throughout central regions of the chest, abdomen, neck, back, and head. To further assess indications of potential differences in cardiac interoceptive accuracy between meditators and nonmeditators, we conducted a meta-analysis including 724 participants and found little evidence for such differences. We conclude that the practice of meditation is not associated with improved cardiac interoceptive awareness.
冥想通常被认为与增强的内感受准确性有关。我们之前发现，经验丰富的冥想者在静息状态下检测心跳感觉的能力并不比非冥想者更强，尽管冥想者报告的主观准确性更高，难度更低。在这里，我们试图克服以前的方法学限制，使用异丙肾上腺素（一种类似于肾上腺素的β-肾上腺素能激动剂）评估在生理唤醒水平下对心跳和呼吸感觉的内感受意识。我们假设冥想者会表现出比非冥想者更高的内感受意识，表现为更高的内感受检测率、更高的内感受准确性以及心跳感觉定位的差异。我们研究了 15 名冥想者和 15 名非冥想者，他们在年龄、性别和体重指数上进行了个体化匹配，使用随机、双盲和安慰剂对照的异丙肾上腺素推注。参与者在输注过程中使用转盘报告他们的心跳和呼吸感觉，之后在二维人体模型上报告他们的心跳感觉位置。尽管冥想者在高剂量时更倾向于报告心肺感觉变化，但没有证据表明任何剂量下的检测率更高或准确性更高。与非冥想者相比，冥想者在心跳定位上表现出明显的地域差异，不成比例地报告胸部、腹部、颈部、背部和头部的中央区域的感觉。为了进一步评估冥想者和非冥想者之间潜在的心脏内感受准确性差异的迹象，我们进行了一项包括 724 名参与者的荟萃分析，几乎没有证据表明存在这种差异。我们的结论是，冥想的实践与改善心脏内感受意识无关。
