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Aspects of self-awareness in meditators and meditation-naïve participants: Self-report versus task performance
Nyklicek,I.
Nyklicek,I.
Abstract
Objectives Meditation may be viewed as a way to enhance mindfulness and self-awareness. To date, most studies have relied on instruments based on self-evaluations. The aim of this study was to explore aspects of self-awareness in experienced meditators compared to non-meditators using a multi-method approach. Methods Thirty-five experienced meditators and 47 matched control participants completed tests ranging from self-report questionnaires of mindfulness skills and psychological mindedness to emotion reports in a scenario task and a behavioral task in which spontaneous momentary experiences are verbally reported. Results Compared to controls, meditators scored higher on self-reported introspective interest and mindfulness skills, but not on emotional awareness. Meditators also showed higher interoception scores during the spontaneous verbal reports task. Interestingly, while mindfulness/Vipassana meditators scored lower on a self-reported mindfulness skill compared to transcendental meditators, they reported more momentary interoceptive and exteroceptive phenomena during the task, the differences being large. Conclusions Different methods assessing complementary aspects of self-awareness show partially mutually opposing results when meditator and non-meditator groups are compared. These results indicate the added value of behavioral tasks when assessing awareness-related phenomena.
Description
All procedures performed in the studies were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments. Ethical approval for the study was obtained from the Institutional Review Board of Tilburg University.
Date
2020
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Publisher
Research Projects
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Keywords
ATTENTION, Awareness, BUDDHIST, CONSCIOUSNESS, Consciousness, EMOTIONS, INTERVENTION, INVENTORY, Introspection, MINDFULNESS QUESTIONNAIRE, Meditation, Mindfulness, NETWORKS, PSYCHOLOGY, STATES
Citation
Nyklicek, I 2020, 'Aspects of self-awareness in meditators and meditation-naïve participants : Self-report versus task performance', Mindfulness, vol. 11, no. 4, pp. 1028-1037. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12671-020-01318-5