Mind the Hype: A Critical Evaluation and Prescriptive Agenda for Research on Mindfulness and Meditation.
Author: Van Dam NT1,2, van Vugt MK3, Vago DR4, Schmalzl L5, Saron CD6, Olendzki A7, Meissner T8, Lazar SW9, Kerr CE10, Gorchov J11, Fox KCR12, Field BA13, Britton WB14, Brefczynski-Lewis JA15, Meyer DE16
Affiliation:
11 Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, University of Melbourne.
22 Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
33 Institute of Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Engineering, University of Groningen.
44 Osher Center for Integrative Medicine, Departments of Psychiatry and Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation, Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
55 College of Science and Integrative Health, Southern California University of Health Sciences.
66 Center for Mind and Brain, University of California, Davis.
77 Integrated Dharma Institute, Amherst, Massachusetts.
88 Center for Mindfulness, University of Massachusetts Medical School.
99 Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School.
1010 Department of Family Medicine, Warren Alpert Medical School at Brown University.
1111 Silver School of Social Work, New York University.
1212 Department of Neurology and Neurological Sciences, Stanford University.
1313 Princeton Neuroscience Institute, Princeton University.
1414 Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Warren Alpert Medical School at Brown University.
1515 Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, School of Medicine, West Virginia University.
1616 Department of Psychology, University of Michigan.
Conference/Journal: Perspect Psychol Sci.
Date published: 2018 Jan
Other:
Volume ID: 13 , Issue ID: 1 , Pages: 36-61 , Special Notes: doi: 10.1177/1745691617709589. Epub 2017 Oct 10. , Word Count: 211
During the past two decades, mindfulness meditation has gone from being a fringe topic of scientific investigation to being an occasional replacement for psychotherapy, tool of corporate well-being, widely implemented educational practice, and "key to building more resilient soldiers." Yet the mindfulness movement and empirical evidence supporting it have not gone without criticism. Misinformation and poor methodology associated with past studies of mindfulness may lead public consumers to be harmed, misled, and disappointed. Addressing such concerns, the present article discusses the difficulties of defining mindfulness, delineates the proper scope of research into mindfulness practices, and explicates crucial methodological issues for interpreting results from investigations of mindfulness. For doing so, the authors draw on their diverse areas of expertise to review the present state of mindfulness research, comprehensively summarizing what we do and do not know, while providing a prescriptive agenda for contemplative science, with a particular focus on assessment, mindfulness training, possible adverse effects, and intersection with brain imaging. Our goals are to inform interested scientists, the news media, and the public, to minimize harm, curb poor research practices, and staunch the flow of misinformation about the benefits, costs, and future prospects of mindfulness meditation.
KEYWORDS: adverse effects; contemplative science; media hype; meditation; mindfulness; misinformation; neuroimaging; psychotherapy
PMID: 29016274 PMCID: PMC5758421 DOI: 10.1177/1745691617709589
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