Brain Gray Matter Changes Associated with Mindfulness Meditation in Older Adults: An Exploratory Pilot Study using Voxelbased Morphometry
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17140/NOJ-1-106Keywords:
Mindfulness; Meditation; Aging; Brain imaging; Voxel-based morphometry.Abstract
Background: Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) have previously been associated with
structural gray matter changes in normal healthy adults. However, it remains unknown if standardized MBIs can induce similar changes in older adults and those with health complaints as
well. The objective of this investigation was to examine the effect of a standardized MBI on
the gray matter tissue of older adults with sleep disturbances.
Methods: This exploratory single-group pilot longitudinal study examined local gray matter
changes over a six-week MBI period. Participants included six older adult community volunteers (M=66.5 years of age, SD=5.5, range=58-75; 66% female) with sleep disturbances recruited through advertisement in local newspapers/flyers posted at a university medical center
and affiliated clinics in Los Angeles, CA. The MBI was delivered as a weekly, two-hour, sixsession, group-based course in mindfulness meditation. Gray matter was measured voxel-wise
pre- and post-intervention.
Results: A significant gray matter increase was identified within the precuneus, possibly implicating meditation-induced changes of the default mode network. In contrast, observed significant gray matter decreases may have been driven by MBI-related remediation of brain
architecture subserving sleep complaints.
Conclusions: Exploratory findings suggest that mindfulness meditation practice is associated
with a detectable alteration of cerebral gray matter in older adults.
References
Black DS, Milam J, Sussman S. Sitting-Meditation Interven-tions Among Youth: A Review of Treatment Efficacy. Pediatrics. 2009; 124(3): 532-541. doi: 10.1542/peds.2008-3434
Goyal M, Singh S, Sibinga EMS, et al. Meditation Programs for Psychological Stress and Well-Being. JAMA Internal Medi-cine. 2014; 174(3): 357-368.
Black DS, Irwin MR, Olmstead R, Ji E, Crabb Breen E, Motivala SJ. Tai chi meditation effects on nuclear factor-kappaB signaling in lonely older adults: a randomized controlled trial. Psychother Psychosom. 2014; 83(5): 315-317. doi: 10.1159/000359956
Black DS, Cole SW, Irwin MR, et al. Yogic meditation re-verses NF-kappaB and IRF-related transcriptome dynamics in leukocytes of family dementia caregivers in a randomized con-trolled trial. Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2013; 38(3): 348-355. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2012.06.011
Hölzel BK, Carmody J, Evans KC, et al. Stress reduction cor-relates with structural changes in the amygdala. Social Cogni-tive and Affective Neuroscience. 2010; 5(1): 11-17. doi: 10.1093/ scan/nsp034
Hölzel BK, Carmody J, Vangel M, et al. Mindfulness practice leads to increases in regional brain gray matter density. Psychia-try Research: Neuroimaging. 2011; 191(30): 36-43.
Hölzel BK, Ott U, Gard T, et al. Investigation of mindfulness meditation practitioners with voxel-based morphometry. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience. 2008; 3(1): 55-61. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsm038
Luders E, Kurth F, Toga AW, Narr KL, Gaser C. Meditation effects within the hippocampal complex revealed by voxel-based morphometry and cytoarchitectonic probabilistic mapping. Frontiers in Psychology. 2013. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00398
Luders E, Toga AW, Lepore N, Gaser C. The underlying ana-tomical correlates of long-term meditation: larger hippocampal and frontal volumes of gray matter. NeuroImage. 2009; 45(3): 672-678.
Kurth F, Mackenzie-Graham A, Toga AW, Luders E. Shifting brain asymmetry: the link between meditation and structural lat-eralization. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2014. doi: 10.1093/scan/ nsu029
Black DS, O’Reilly GA, Olmstead R, Breen EC, Irwin MR. Mindfulness-based intervention for prodromal sleep disturbanc-es in older adults: Design and methodology of a randomized controlled trial. Contemp Clin Trials. 2014; 39(1): 22-27. doi: 10.1016/j.cct.2014.06.013
Buysse DJ, Reynolds CF. 3rd, Monk TH, Berman SR, Kup-fer DJ. The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index: a new instrument for psychiatric practice and research. Psychiatry Res. 1989; 28(2): 193-213. doi: 10.1016/0165-1781(89)90047-4)
Kroenke K, Spitzer RL, Williams JB. The PHQ-9: validity of a brief depression severity measure. J Gen Intern Med. 2001; 16(9): 606-613.
Galla BM, O’Reilly GA, Kitil MJ, Smalley SL, Black DS. Community-Based Mindfulness Program for Disease Preven-tion and Health Promotion: Targeting Stress Reduction. Ameri-can Journal of Health Promotion : AJHP. 2014.
Kurth F, Luders E, Sicotte NL, et al. Neuroprotective ef-fects of testosterone treatment in men with multiple sclero-sis. NeuroImage Clinical. 2014; 4: 454-460. doi: 10.1016/j. nicl.2014.03.001
Hayasaka S, Phan KL, Liberzon I, Worsley KJ, Nichols TE. Nonstationary cluster-size inference with random field and permutation methods. Neuroimage. 2004; 22(2): 676-687. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2004.01.041
Raichle ME, MacLeod AM, Snyder AZ, Powers WJ, Gus-nard DA, Shulman GL. A default mode of brain function. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2001; 98(2): 676-682. doi: 10.1073/ pnas.98.2.676
Hölzel BK, Lazar SW, Gard T, Schuman-Olivier Z, Vago DR, Ott U. How Does Mindfulness Meditation Work? Proposing Mechanisms of Action From a Conceptual and Neural Perspec-tive. Perspectives on Psychological Science. 2011; 6(6): 537. doi: 10.1177/1745691611419671
Vago DR, Silbersweig DA. Self-Awareness, Self-Regula-tion, and Self-Transcendence (S-ART): A Framework for Un-derstanding the Neurobiological Mechanisms of Mindfulness. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. 2012; 6(296). doi: 10.3389/ fnhum.2012.00296
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
All content published in Neuro (NEURO) is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0). This license allows anyone to copy, distribute, transmit, and adapt the work — including for commercial purposes — provided appropriate credit is given to the original author(s) and source.