Focused attention meditation training modifies neural activity and attention in patients after traumatic brain injury

2018 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 16K20877
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Rehabilitation science/Welfare engineering; Developmental mechanisms and the body works
• Research Institution: Hokkaido University
• Principal Investigator: Yoshida Kazuki 北海道大学, 保健科学研究院, 助教 (90638280)
• Research Collaborator: Sakai Shinya
• Project Period (FY): 2016-04-01 – 2019-03-31
• Keywords: 瞑想 / 注意訓練 / 脳波 / fMRI / リハビリテーション

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Cross-sectional studies have highlighted high cognitive performance and discriminative neural activity in experienced meditators. However, a causal relationship between neural activity changes and improvement of attention caused by meditation training remains to be elucidated. To investigate this, we conducted a longitudinal study which evaluated the results of electroencephalography (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance image (fMRI) during resting state, meditation, attention task before and after 8 weeks of meditation training. The meditation training group showed higher P3 amplitude during attention task and shorter reaction time. In addition, there were significant correlation between theta band phase synchrony index (PSI) during meditation and P3 amplitude during attention task. In contrast, these correlation were not observed in control group. These findings provide direct causal evidence of the effectiveness of meditation training.

Free Research Field

リハビリテーション科学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究は8週間の集中瞑想が注意機能を向上させ、その背景にはF4-Pz、F4-Ozにおけるθ波の位相同期値が関与することを示した研究である。これまで瞑想熟達者と未経験者の比較から、瞑想の効果を示唆してきた横断的研究が多い中、その研究を縦断的にしめし、かつその背景にある脳活動を示した点で学術的意義をゆうする。またリハビリテーションへの応用を考慮した場合、本研究のような縦断的データが重要であり、集中瞑想訓練のリハビリテーションへの応用可能性を示すという点で社会的意義を有す。