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The Mindfulness Meditation Effect on Brain Electrical Activity: Stress Assessment, Concentration State and Quality of Life

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The Mindfulness Meditation Effect on Brain Electrical Activity: Stress Assessment, Concentration State and Quality of Life The Mindfulness Meditation Effect on Brain Electrical Activity: Stress Assessment, Concentration State and Quality of Life Pedro Morais1,2,3 1 and Carla Quintão1,2 2 1Department of Physics, Faculty of Sciences and Technology, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal 2Laboratory for Instrumentation, Biomedical Engineering and Radiation Physics, UNL, Lisbon, Portugal 3Biomedical Engineering Doctoral Program, UNL, Lisbon, Portugal 1 RESEARCH PROBLEM Mindfulness meditation emerges as a part of the solution, easily accessible to the average citizen, not Modern societies are oriented towards a model of life only from a therapeutic viewpoint, but mostly as a that is increasingly competitive, agitated and proactive way to prevent and respond to some of the demanding. A large part of the population responds, health disturbances that affect that part of the on a daily basis, quickly and under a great amount of population. Such approach is a mental technique for stress to their professional responsibilities and controlling the individuals’ mental state and, in household chores, with little time to relax. A pre- consequence, their own well-being. Mindfulness is programmed way of life, constantly pressed, where rooted on the principle that the non-judgmental there is no opportunity to think, rest or contemplate observation of the present, disconnected from past everything that is good around us, imposes timings, experiences and future expectations, calms down which are contrary to one’s natural rhythms. The one´s own mind. consequences of this, at first, include changes in the Recent studies have identified brain areas quantity and quality of sleep; in food intake habits, correlated with the positive effects of meditation that tend to become inadequate and unhealthy; and in (Davidson, R.J et al, 2003). However, the underlying fatigue, that becomes chronic. Over time, the harmful neuronal mechanisms of such correlates are still effects to one´s health are numerous. Heart problems; unclear, and it is evident that rigorous and systematic body aches; weight loss or gain; hormonal changes; scientific research is needed, to fully understand the or even difficulty in social relationships, with role of meditation onto mental states and neuronal concomitant isolation from others are common positive adaptation. Hence, future studies should complaints (Institute of Medicine, 2006). address the relation between conscious Mindfulness Psychological disorders as depression, anxiety and meditation and neuronal circuit changes. In addition, stress begin, either alone or together, to take a most published work, in this area, perform only significant role in our daily lives. In Europe, Portugal comparative studies between experimental and stands out as a country in which these types of health control groups at one single instant, disregarding the problems are prevalent. One third of its population intrinsic dynamic nature of the training and use reports some degree of health perturbations caused by effects of meditation. Besides, electrophysiologic accelerated life styles (Health General Directorate, signals, such as electroencephalogram (EEG), 2017). This vulnerable and sickly way of living electrocardiogram (ECG) and electrodermal activity contributes to an increasingly depressed and anxious (EDA) are often studied individually (Tang, Y.Y. et society. It leads also to the rise of drug consumption, al, 2015), whereas we believe that the information often self-medicated, relieving the symptoms in produced by each technique may validate and certain cases, but not addressing the source of the potentiate the understanding of the phenomena at problems. study. Finally, self-assessment surveys are often not The aforementioned scenario constitutes a serious included in studies, preventing a reliable relation public health concern, requiring urgent measures. We between neurophysiologic data and changes in believe that such measures should involve the quality-of-life, which could be easily and development of brain mechanisms of self-regulation. unequivocally reported by the participants. 1 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1774-7093 2 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1015-4655 20 Morais, P. and Quintão, C. The Mindfulness Meditation Effect on Brain Electrical Activity: Stress Assessment, Concentration State and Quality of Life. In Doctoral Consortium (BIOSTEC 2019), pages 20-27 Copyright c 2019 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved The Mindfulness Meditation Effect on Brain Electrical Activity: Stress Assessment, Concentration State and Quality of Life Thus, an integrated and longitudinal research, associated with an increased gamma activity including personal surveys, is required to accurately (Hinterberger, T., 2014). assess potential mental health benefits of Mindfulness Although, there has been significant progress and meditation. maturation in Mindfulness meditation research, a careful review of the reported outcomes, reveals that it is necessary to deepen the neuroscientific 2 OBJECTIVES knowledge about brain function changes and how Mindfulness can be effectively used in the context of The current PhD study, in Biomedical Engineering, mental disorders and to improve one’s quality of life intends to show that Mindfulness meditation practice, (Van Dam, N.T. et al, 2018). with its goal of being "here and now", improves one’s mental health, as demonstrate via attentive self- regulation and a decrease in anxiety, depression and 4 METHODOLOGY stress. Through a thorough data collection and analysis strategy, we aim to conclude that this type of The current study is based on a set of tasks, involving meditation can be used as a valid approach to deal visual stimuli, concentration tests and stress-inducing with clinical disorders, which affect a large portion of challenges. 30 individuals were submitted to a the population. Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) course and evaluated at regular intervals, in a period of 12 weeks (Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction, 2018). 3 STATE OF THE ART In 4 scheduled sessions, EEG, ECG and EDA signals were recorded, while subjects performed the Mindfulness meditation emerges as an easy-to-use aforementioned tasks. In each session, subjects filled in three questionnaires, assessing their current quality way to promote an individual’s well-being, as well, as a technique to prevent and treat a specific range of of life; mood state profile; and depression, anxiety and stress levels. Through exploration of the widespread mental illnesses. It has evolved recorded physiological data, we will search for throughout the world, and gave its practitioners a significant improvement in quality of life (Kabat- functional changes that may occur in the autonomic and central nervous systems, as a result of the Zinn, J., 2003). Due to the good results achieved, it was adopted in some countries as a curricular Mindfulness practice. After attending the course, discipline in secondary education and used in medical each subject may experience one or several of the following: changes in their heart rate and sweating care (Center for Mindfulness in Medicine Health Care and Society, 2018). levels; the ability to concentrate; as well as in the Research made in this area, in particular those control of individual emotional responses to their surroundings. Assuming that such effects are using functional MRI during cognitive tasks, identified individual regions, associated to specific established, it will be important also to assess how functional changes after meditation, including the they can be operationalized, not only to treat mental disorders, but also to help prevent them. In addition, prefrontal cortex; insula; hippocampus; and amygdala (Kilpatrick, L.A., 2011). These areas were it is important to note that the proposed strategy also mentioned in brain volumetric studies using would have the added benefits of a low-cost intervention, in a positive life-changing approach, structural MRI, in which variations of brain mass were reported. However, the published research did with no known negative side effects. not always agree. In some cases, the conclusions were even contradictory. 4.1 Participants Recruitment and EEG, with its particularly high temporal Characterization resolution, has also been used as a non-invasive technique to analyse spatiotemporal data from brain Since this project is being conducted in the Faculty of electrical activity, providing relevant information Sciences and Technology of Nova University of about neural networks (Michel, C.M et al, 2004). Lisbon, the recruiting information for the study was These studies showed that practicing Mindfulness made available via a poster in one of the most affluent meditation leads to an alpha power increase and also places of the school, and an announcement made via showed that focusing one’s attention can be e-mail for all students, teachers and staff. Both contained a link where all interested volunteers could obtain more detailed information about the MBSR 21 DCBIOSTEC 2019 - Doctoral Consortium on Biomedical Engineering Systems and Technologies course (duration, name of the instructor, schedule…), phase of the survey includes personal life as well as the kind of award certificate of attendance. qualification, with 34 questions assessing whether the An immediate pre-selection was made after individual felt happy, satisfied or good about various completing a small inquiry, which excluded aspects of their life, ranging from "Very Unsatisfied" candidates
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