Exploration of psychological mechanisms of the reduced stress response in long-term meditation practitioners.
Author: Liudmila G1, Pierre-Yves B2, Guido B3, Matthias K4
Affiliation:
1Institute of Social Sciences of Religions (ISSR), University of Lausanne, Quartier UNIL-Chamberonne, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland; Swiss National Center of Competences in Research LIVES-Overcoming vulnerability: life course perspectives, Switzerland. Electronic address: liudmila.gamaiunova@unil.ch.
2Institute of Social Sciences of Religions (ISSR), University of Lausanne, Quartier UNIL-Chamberonne, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland.
3Department of Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, Geneva University Hospitals, Rue Gabrielle-Perret-Gentil 4, CH-1205 Geneva, Switzerland.
4Department of Psychology, University of Geneva, Boulevard du Pont-d'Arve 40, 1204 Geneva, Switzerland; Swiss National Center of Competences in Research LIVES-Overcoming vulnerability: life course perspectives, Switzerland.
Conference/Journal: Psychoneuroendocrinology.
Date published: 2019 Feb 26
Other:
Volume ID: 104 , Pages: 143-151 , Special Notes: doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2019.02.026. [Epub ahead of print] , Word Count: 203
Previous research links contemplative practices, such as meditation, with stress reduction. However, little is known about the psychological mechanisms underlying this relationship. This study compares the physiological stress response (reactivity and recovery) measured by changes in salivary cortisol, heart rate, heart rate variability, and the associated stress-related ratings in long-term meditation practitioners (N = 29) and age- and sex- matched meditation naïve controls (N = 26). The participants were administered the Trier Social Stress Test in its active and placebo versions. The results demonstrated that long-term meditation practitioners had faster cortisol recovery from stress, and experienced less shame and higher self-esteem after the exposure to social-evaluative threat. In addition, long-term meditation practitioners scored higher on adaptive cognitive emotion regulation strategies, such as acceptance and positive reappraisal, and lower on maladaptive ones, such as catastrophizing. The cognitive emotion regulation strategy of acceptance mediated the relationship between meditation practice and cortisol recovery. These results suggest that meditation practice is associated with faster recovery from stress due to the employment of adaptive emotion regulation strategy of acceptance, delineating a pathway underlying the positive effects of meditation on stress.
Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
KEYWORDS: Cognitive appraisals; Contemplative practices; Emotion regulation; Self-conscious emotions; Stress; TSST
PMID: 30849720 DOI: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2019.02.026
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