Enhancing Attention by Synchronizing Respiration and Fingertip Pressure: A Pilot Study Using Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy
Sustained attention is a fundamental ability ensuring effective cognitive processing and can be enhanced by meditation practice. However, keeping a focused meditative state is challenging for novices because involuntary mind-wandering frequently occurs during their practice. Inspired by the potentia...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2019-11-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Neuroscience |
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| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnins.2019.01209/full |
| _version_ | 1818296100865441792 |
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| author | Yi-Lei Zheng Yi-Lei Zheng Dang-Xiao Wang Dang-Xiao Wang Dang-Xiao Wang Yu-Ru Zhang Yu-Ru Zhang Yi-Yuan Tang |
| author_facet | Yi-Lei Zheng Yi-Lei Zheng Dang-Xiao Wang Dang-Xiao Wang Dang-Xiao Wang Yu-Ru Zhang Yu-Ru Zhang Yi-Yuan Tang |
| author_sort | Yi-Lei Zheng |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Sustained attention is a fundamental ability ensuring effective cognitive processing and can be enhanced by meditation practice. However, keeping a focused meditative state is challenging for novices because involuntary mind-wandering frequently occurs during their practice. Inspired by the potential of force-control tasks in invoking internal somatic attention, we proposed a haptics-assisted meditation (HAM) to help reduce mind-wandering and enhance attention. During HAM, participants were instructed to maintain awareness on the respiration and meanwhile adjust bimanual fingertip pressures to keep synchronized with the respiration. This paradigm required somatosensory attention as a physiological foundation, aiming to help novices meditate starting with the body and gradually gain essential meditation skills. A cross-sectional study on 12 novices indicated that the participants reported less mind-wandering during HAM compared with the classic breath-counting meditation (BCM). In a further longitudinal study, the experimental group with 10 novices showed significantly improved performance in several attentional tests after 5 days’ practice of HAM. They tended to show more significant improvements in a few tests than did the control group performing the 5-day BCM practice. To investigate the brain activities related to HAM, we applied functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to record cerebral hemodynamic responses from the prefrontal and sensorimotor cortices when performing HAM, and we assessed the changes in cerebral activation and functional connectivity (FC) after the 5-day HAM practice. The prefrontal and sensorimotor regions demonstrated a uniform activation when performing HAM, and there was a significant increase in the right prefrontal activation after the practice. We also observed significant changes in the FC between the brain regions related to the attention networks. These behavioral and neural findings together provided preliminary evidence for the effectiveness of HAM on attention enhancement in the early stage of meditation learning. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-13T03:58:10Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-19e99fbdc3ce44b3ac811a16fe453837 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1662-453X |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-13T03:58:10Z |
| publishDate | 2019-11-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Neuroscience |
| spelling | doaj.art-19e99fbdc3ce44b3ac811a16fe4538372022-12-22T00:00:33ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Neuroscience1662-453X2019-11-011310.3389/fnins.2019.01209465545Enhancing Attention by Synchronizing Respiration and Fingertip Pressure: A Pilot Study Using Functional Near-Infrared SpectroscopyYi-Lei Zheng0Yi-Lei Zheng1Dang-Xiao Wang2Dang-Xiao Wang3Dang-Xiao Wang4Yu-Ru Zhang5Yu-Ru Zhang6Yi-Yuan Tang7State Key Laboratory of Virtual Reality Technology and Systems, Beihang University, Beijing, ChinaPeng Cheng Laboratory, Shenzhen, ChinaState Key Laboratory of Virtual Reality Technology and Systems, Beihang University, Beijing, ChinaPeng Cheng Laboratory, Shenzhen, ChinaBeijing Advanced Innovation Center for Biomedical Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing, ChinaState Key Laboratory of Virtual Reality Technology and Systems, Beihang University, Beijing, ChinaBeijing Advanced Innovation Center for Biomedical Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing, ChinaDepartment of Psychological Sciences, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TX, United StatesSustained attention is a fundamental ability ensuring effective cognitive processing and can be enhanced by meditation practice. However, keeping a focused meditative state is challenging for novices because involuntary mind-wandering frequently occurs during their practice. Inspired by the potential of force-control tasks in invoking internal somatic attention, we proposed a haptics-assisted meditation (HAM) to help reduce mind-wandering and enhance attention. During HAM, participants were instructed to maintain awareness on the respiration and meanwhile adjust bimanual fingertip pressures to keep synchronized with the respiration. This paradigm required somatosensory attention as a physiological foundation, aiming to help novices meditate starting with the body and gradually gain essential meditation skills. A cross-sectional study on 12 novices indicated that the participants reported less mind-wandering during HAM compared with the classic breath-counting meditation (BCM). In a further longitudinal study, the experimental group with 10 novices showed significantly improved performance in several attentional tests after 5 days’ practice of HAM. They tended to show more significant improvements in a few tests than did the control group performing the 5-day BCM practice. To investigate the brain activities related to HAM, we applied functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to record cerebral hemodynamic responses from the prefrontal and sensorimotor cortices when performing HAM, and we assessed the changes in cerebral activation and functional connectivity (FC) after the 5-day HAM practice. The prefrontal and sensorimotor regions demonstrated a uniform activation when performing HAM, and there was a significant increase in the right prefrontal activation after the practice. We also observed significant changes in the FC between the brain regions related to the attention networks. These behavioral and neural findings together provided preliminary evidence for the effectiveness of HAM on attention enhancement in the early stage of meditation learning.https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnins.2019.01209/fullsustained attentioncognitive improvementmeditationfunctional near-infrared spectroscopyrespirationfingertip pressure |
| spellingShingle | Yi-Lei Zheng Yi-Lei Zheng Dang-Xiao Wang Dang-Xiao Wang Dang-Xiao Wang Yu-Ru Zhang Yu-Ru Zhang Yi-Yuan Tang Enhancing Attention by Synchronizing Respiration and Fingertip Pressure: A Pilot Study Using Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy Frontiers in Neuroscience sustained attention cognitive improvement meditation functional near-infrared spectroscopy respiration fingertip pressure |
| title | Enhancing Attention by Synchronizing Respiration and Fingertip Pressure: A Pilot Study Using Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy |
| title_full | Enhancing Attention by Synchronizing Respiration and Fingertip Pressure: A Pilot Study Using Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy |
| title_fullStr | Enhancing Attention by Synchronizing Respiration and Fingertip Pressure: A Pilot Study Using Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy |
| title_full_unstemmed | Enhancing Attention by Synchronizing Respiration and Fingertip Pressure: A Pilot Study Using Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy |
| title_short | Enhancing Attention by Synchronizing Respiration and Fingertip Pressure: A Pilot Study Using Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy |
| title_sort | enhancing attention by synchronizing respiration and fingertip pressure a pilot study using functional near infrared spectroscopy |
| topic | sustained attention cognitive improvement meditation functional near-infrared spectroscopy respiration fingertip pressure |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnins.2019.01209/full |
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