The mindful eye: Smooth pursuit and saccadic eye movements in meditators and non-meditators

Kumari, V, Antonova, E, Wright, B ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1256-5503, Hamid, A, Hernandez, EM, Schmechtig, A and Ettinger, U, 2017. The mindful eye: Smooth pursuit and saccadic eye movements in meditators and non-meditators. Consciousness and Cognition, 48, pp. 66-75. ISSN 1053-8100

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Abstract

Background:
This study examined the effects of cultivated (i.e. developed through training) and dispositional (trait) mindfulness on smooth pursuit (SPEM) and antisaccade (AS) tasks known to engage the fronto-parietal network implicated in attentional and motion detection processes, and the fronto-striatal network implicated in cognitive control, respectively.
Methods:
Sixty healthy men (19–59 years), of whom 30 were experienced mindfulness practitioners and 30 meditation-naïve, underwent infrared oculographic assessment of SPEM and AS performance. Trait mindfulness was assessed using the self-report Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ).
Results:
Meditators, relative to meditation-naïve individuals, made significantly fewer catch-up and anticipatory saccades during the SPEM task, and had significantly lower intra-individual variability in gain and spatial error during the AS task. No SPEM or AS measure correlated significantly with FFMQ scores in meditation-naïve individuals.
Conclusions:
Cultivated, but not dispositional, mindfulness is associated with improved attention and sensorimotor control as indexed by SPEM and AS tasks.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Consciousness and Cognition
Creators:	Kumari, V., Antonova, E., Wright, B., Hamid, A., Hernandez, E.M., Schmechtig, A. and Ettinger, U.
Publisher:	Elsevier
Date:	February 2017
Volume:	48
ISSN:	1053-8100
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1016/j.concog.2016.10.008 DOI S1053810016302100 Publisher Item Identifier
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Linda Sullivan
Date Added:	09 Jan 2017 11:05
Last Modified:	09 Jun 2017 14:10
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/29602

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