Meditation and Neuroscience

There is an increasing amount of research being done on the effects of meditation on the brain (see this article in Time on one recent application of this research). The following are a good sampling of some of that work. Some of them are a bit technical, but some of it should be understandable (particularly the videos).

Meditation and the Neuroscience of Consciousness
Antoine Lutz, John D. Dunne, Richard J. Davidson

Regulation of the Neural Circuitry of Emotion by Compassion Meditation: Effects of Meditative Expertise
Antoine Lutz, Julie Brefczynski-Lewis, Tom Johnstone, Richard J. Davidson

Long-term Meditators Self-induce High-amplitude Gamma Synchrony During Mental Practice
Antoine Lutz, Lawrence L. Greischar, Nancy B. Rawlings, Matthieu Ricard, and Richard J. Davidson

Attention Regulation and Monitoring in Meditation
Antoine Lutz, Heleen A. Slagter, John D. Dunne, and Richard J. Davidson

Neural Correlates of Attentional Expertise in Long-term Meditation Practitioners
J. A. Brefczynski-Lewis, A. Lutz, H. S. Schaefer, D. B. Levinson, and R. J. Davidson

Alterations in Brain and Immune Function Produced by Mindfulness Meditation
Richard J. Davidson, Jon Kabat-Zinn, Jessica Schumacher, Melissa Rosenkranz, Daniel Muller, Saki F. Santorelli, Ferris Urbanowski, Anne Harrington, Katherine Bonus, and John F. Sheridan

Daniel Goleman has written a more 'popular' piece on compassion meditation and happiness:

Finding Happiness: Cajole Your Brain to Lean to the Left

Two of the monks who have participated in Davidson and Goleman’s studies are Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche (author of The Joy of Living and, most recently, Joyful Wisdom) and Matthieu Ricard (“the happiest man in the world” and author of Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life's Most Important Skill) and both are good authors to read up on. Ricard has a very good Google presentation: Change your Mind Change your Brain: The Inner Conditions for Authentic Happiness. I would also suggest Philippe Goldan’s Cognitive Neuroscience of Mindfulness Meditation and Michael Spezio’s Mindfulness in the Brain. Finally, Richard Davidson has a lecture titled Be Happy Like a Monk (Part 1, Part 2, and Q&A).

Since I posted the entry on Zen Brain, the Upaya Institute and Zen Center has had a 7-part Science Meets Meditation series with Alan Wallace. I haven't had the chance to listen to them yet, but Wallace is a very familiar name in Ameican Buddhism, so it could be worthwhile.

The systematic research of the physical and psychological effects of meditation is currently on the uprise, allowing us to at least partially move beyond anecdotal evidence or traditional claims as to its effects.

Zen Brain

The Upaya Institute and Zen Center has a series of podcasts on meditation and neuroscience.

Zen Brain: "Science is just now documenting what meditators have known for millennia. Jim Austin calls meditation “artful attention” and discusses the importance of this skill in our lives. He talks about his own experience both as a Zen student and a neurologist looking at the brain in relation to meditation."

Zen Brain 1: "Science journalist and New York Times contributor Sandra Blakeslee provides an overview of how recent developments in neuroscience have changed the way we view the impact of various practices, including meditation, upon brain structure and function."

Zen Brain 2: "Neuroscientist Richard Davidson provides an introduction to brain systems that may be relevant to meditation. This presentation gives an orientation to neurophysiology and lays the foundation for Dr. Davidson’s second presentation which discusses the relationship between the brain and meditation."

Richard Davidson has done some excellent work on meditation and neuroscience; he will come up again on this blog. James Austin is best known for his earliest work on Zen and neuroscience, Zen and the Brain: Toward an Understanding of Meditation and Consciousness, which I haven't read so I can't vouch for his work. He is, however, one of the most long-standing researchers on the neurological effects of meditation. Finally, this is the first time I've ever heard of Sandra Blakeslee, but she seems to be a lay expert on neuroscience.

Also, take a look at Upaya's other dharma talk podcasts.

What is Meditation?

The best way to start this blog would be to address the question, "What is meditation?" This is a question I will address on a few occasions, particularly to correct some very common misunderstandings many have about the nature of meditation. I wish to start, however, with a useful description given by Sakyong Mipham, heir to the Shambhala lineage, in his book, Turning the Mind Into an Ally:

Even though the bewildered mind is untrained, it is already meditating, whether we know it or not. Meditation is the natural process of becoming familiar with an object by repeatedly placing our minds upon it. Whatever we're doing, we always have a view; we're always placing our mind on one object or another. (24)

One of the primary goals of meditation is to train the mind in its ability to attend to or concentrate on whatever it is that we are doing. The Sanskrit word for meditation is bhavana which means to "cultivate" or "develop" and it is always used in reference to the mind. Much like the body, which we all think can benefit from exercise, the mind can also be trained, yet we rarely set aside time each week to train the mind while we will make an effort to schedule time to exercise our body. One reason for this might be that we think that these capacities are innate and permanent, incapable of cultivation or development. Another reason could be our penchant to think that our happiness depends on external conditions: having a beautiful body, having money, fame, and sex, or having a beautiful girlfriend/boyfriend/spouse are (supposedly) what give us happiness, so we ignore the mind as a potential source of contentment and joy in our lives. One way or the other, the training of the mind does not have a place of importance in 21st century America.

There are many different meditation practices that are meant to train the mind's natural capacities of attention and concentration (shamatha bhavana, concentration meditation). There are also many different meditations that use the power of attention/concentration by directing the mind towards wholesome things and penetrating into the nature of all phenomena (vipassana bhavana, wisdom meditation). This is the core of meditation and any religious trappings are secondary to cultivating this concentration and clarity.