Mantra Meditation Suppression of Default Mode Beyond an Active Task: a Pilot Study

Abstract

Within the field of neuroimaging, the discovery of a constellation of brain regions silently active when we are Bresting^has provided a new view into the elusive effects of meditative practice. This network, called the default mode network (DMN), has been shown by functional neuroimaging to be active when an individual is at rest. Meta-analyses of the fMRI neurocorrelates of meditation have shown that across diverse practices, the most common general effect appears to be modulation of regions within the DMN. The specific practice of mantra meditation is a form of task-positive concentration. These kinds of task-positive activities are regarded by many to be an anti-correlate of DMN activity, thereby in theory, reducing activations within the DMN as concentration on a particular task increases. Yet previous studies on mantra meditation using language tasks as controls have reported only activations, not deactivations within the DMN. A study by Berkovich-Ohana showed that word repetition as control task could mask some of the effects of mantra, which may explain why previous studies using language repetition as control task failed to find significant DMN deactivations during mantra meditation. To investigate these differences, we analyzed mantra meditation using a finger-tapping control task which required a minimal amount of focused attention, yet enough to reduce blood flow to the major hubs of the DMN and minimally reduce network activity. Using a finger-tapping control thus modifies the research question: Can a brief course of this kind be shown to modulate DMN activations during mantra practice beyond that of a minimally active/nonlanguage finger-tapping control condition; and if so, can we see a training effect over time? Our results show that over a 2-week period of Kundalini yoga/meditation, participants successfully decreased activations within subregions of the DMN, namely the pregenual anterior cingulate cortex (PACC) and the precuneus, during mantra meditation with trends toward decreased activation in the posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) as well. These decreased activations were significant despite use of a finger-tapping control task known to deactivate these regions, indicating that mantra practice suppresses activation in these DMN regions beyond the active control task. These results emphasize the importance of the choice of control task and provide insight into the Bmantra effect.^Here, we show that training in mantra meditation, like other practices such as focused attention and open monitoring, also has a suppressive effect on activity within the DMN.

Pathways to well-being: Untangling the causal relationships among biopsychosocial variables

“…This activation has been linked to worse cognitive performance as well as deficits in attention and working memory in healthy individuals (Whitfield-Gabrieli and Ford, 2012), and appears to be associated with several psychiatric conditions (Buckner et al, 2008;Whitfield-Gabrieli and Ford, 2012). Several studies also indicate that psychological interventions are capable of reducing rumination as well as reducing DMN activity (Garrison et al, 2015;Simon et al, 2017) and also that reductions in rumination result in significant improvements in psychiatric symptoms (Kaplan et al, 2018;Perestelo-Perez et al, 2017;Querstret and Cropley, 2013;van der Velden, 2015).…”

“…Studies have also demonstrated that engaging in cognitive tasks reduce the activity of the DMN (Buckner et al, 2008;Raichle et al, 2001) and this may explain why engaging in intellectual activities appear to significantly lower the risk of dementia (Blacker and Weuve, 2018;Lee, 2018;Sajeev et al, 2016;Yates et al, 2016), as well as why educated individuals have a lower rate of dementia (Ngandu et al, 2007;Qiu et al, 2009). It is also interesting to note that trait mindfulness is strongly negatively correlated with rumination (Keng et al, 2011;Perestelo-Perez et al, 2017;Tomlinson et al, 2017) and the practice of meditation is capable of reducing the DMN activity beyond the typical reductions observed during cognitive tasks (Garrison et al, 2015;Simon et al, 2017).…”

A Review of the Methodology, Taxonomy, and Definitions in Recent fMRI Research on Meditation

“…"Mind-wandering": The motivation to cultivate wholesome qualities were mostly to reduce unwholesome qualities, which often were described in terms of mind-wandering and related terms such as "stimulusindependent thought" (Ellamil et al, 2016), "random thinking processes" (Hernandez et al, 2018), or: "Mind-wandering is here defined as off-task thinking such as memory retrieval, planning for the future, or judging the present" (Scheibner et al, 2017). "Distraction": Another term which was related to mind-wandering was distraction, and one of the aims of focused attention meditation is to "disengage from distractors" (Simon et al, 2017) or to "keep the practitioner's attention away from distractors, such as par-ticular bodily sensations, feelings, and thoughts, which evoke mind-wandering" (Fujino et al, 2018). "Rumination": Meditators were trained to avoid distractions in the sphere of rumination, a concept that seldom was explained.…”

“…Kim et al (2019),Scheibner et al (2017),Shao et al (2016),Simon et al (2017),Xiao et al (2019) Self-focusedShao et al (2016) …”

Editorial Special Topic: Enhancing Brain and Cognition Through Meditation

“…With regard to brain imaging studies, Simon et al (2017) investigated whether a specific practice of mantra meditation, supposed to increase concentration, induces deactivations within the default mode network (DMN), as previous studies on mantra meditation have reported only activations within the DMN. Authors found that a 2-week period of Kundalini yoga/meditation decreased activations within subregions of the DMN, showing that training in mantra meditation, like focused attention and open monitoring, has a suppressive effect on activity within the DMN.…”