Abstract

Objective

Preliminary findings suggest that different kinds of meditation could work on diverse cognitive and psychological processes. The present study aimed at disentangling the effects of three mindfulness techniques on mental rumination and subjective time perspective. Design: 75 young healthy participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions: mindful breathing, body scan, observing-thoughts meditation and an active control condition. The meditation groups practiced mindfulness daily and attended weekly group meetings for 8 weeks, while the control group was involved in reading and discussing a book about mindfulness. Main outcome measures: Self-report measures of mindfulness skills, ruminative thinking, attitude towards time, anxiety, depression and personality traits. Results: In all meditation conditions, analysis of covariance showed a significant improvement in mindfulness skills compared to the control group. We found a specific effect of mindful breathing in reducing participants’ tendency to brooding and in increasing their positive vision of the future, compared to all other conditions. Conclusions: As expected, we found some differential effects: breathing meditation helped practitioners to train more effectively their ability to disengage from maladaptive ruminative thoughts, which could be reflected in a more optimistic attitude toward the future. These results provide useful information to structure better mindfulness-based interventions.

摘要

客观的

初步研究结果表明，不同类型的冥想可以对不同的认知和心理过程起作用。本研究旨在解开三种正念技术对心理反刍和主观时间视角的影响。设计： 75 名年轻健康参与者被随机分配到以下四种条件之一：正念呼吸、身体扫描、观察思维冥想和主动控制条件。冥想组每天练习正念并参加为期 8 周的每周小组会议，而对照组则参与阅读和讨论一本关于正念的书。主要结果测量：正念技能、反刍思维、时间态度、焦虑、抑郁和人格特征的自我报告测量。结果：在所有冥想条件下，协方差分析显示，与对照组相比，正念技能有显着提高。我们发现，与所有其他条件相比，正念呼吸在减少参与者沉思的倾向和增加他们对未来的积极愿景方面具有特定的效果。结论：正如预期的那样，我们发现了一些不同的效果：呼吸冥想帮助从业者更有效地训练他们摆脱不适应反刍思维的能力，这可以反映在对未来的更乐观态度上。这些结果为构建更好的基于正念的干预措施提供了有用的信息。