Study finds clear –yet surprisingly different–benefits in 3 types of meditation-based mental training

___ As citizens of the 21st century, we face many problems that come with an industrialized and globalized world. I’m not a lawyer or a politician, but a psychologist and neuroscientist. So research on how to train helpful mental and social capacities is my way to contribute to a more healthy, communal, and cooperative civilization. For the past five years, that research has taken the form of the ReSource Project, one of the longest and most comprehensive studies on the effects of meditation-based mental training to date. Lots of research treats the concept of meditation as a single practice, when in fact meditation encompasses a diversity of mental practices that train different skills and different parts of the brain. Our goal was to study the specific effects of some major types of mental practices and distinguish their effects on well-being, the brain, behavior, and health—and, in particular, discover which practices could help build a more compassionate and interconnected world. The results so far have been mostly encouraging, sometimes surprising, and crucial to understand for meditation practitioners and teachers. Three types of meditation-based mental training In the ReSource Project, we asked over 300 German adults ages 20–55 to attend a two-hour class every week and practice for 30 minutes a day at home. The lessons and practices were designed by myself together with an expert team of meditation teachers and psychologists over the course of several years....
Source: SharpBrains - Category: Neuroscience Authors: Tags: Cognitive Neuroscience Education & Lifelong Learning Health & Wellness affective attention behavior brain cognitive-abilities compassion higher-level meditation meditation-based mental-training mindfulness Psychology ReSource Source Type: blogs