Midterm 1: ANTHRO 272

What is Mindfulness?

The awareness that arises when you are paying attention, on purpose, in the present, non-judgmentally

What are 2 things meditation involves?

Focus and Relaxation

What does it mean to meditate?

To engage in contemplation or reflection for the purpose of reaching a heightened level of spiritual awareness

Meditation is a practice of ____

concentrated focus

How do you increase awareness of the present moment?

Reduces stress, promotes relaxation, and enhances spiritual growth

What is the opposite of an undisturbed mind?

A disturbed mind full of angst

Over time, stress has what effect on us?

Stress creates illness

What does the prefrontal cortex allow us to do?

The prefrontal cortex allows us to anticipate the future (worry about it) and think about the past (regret it)

What is Vipassana?

Penetrating insight, a form of buddhist meditation that is the most common

What is a Vipassana retreat?

A meditation retreat that lasts 10 days! Focusing on your breath first then scan the body’s sensation

How does meditation help with pain maintenance?

Body scan meditation can teach one to separate the cognitive (thinking) and emotional parts from the sensation. Breath awareness can also district the mind

What is B. Alan Wallace’s “Mindful Attention Training”

Focus on your breath, observe the natural flow of your mind stream, rest in the subtle awareness

What does the amygdala do?

The amygdala is the brain’s radar for threat. It connects strongly to brain circuitry for both focusing our attention and for intense emotional reactions

How does meditation affect activity in the amygdala?

The amygdala shows dampened activity and the person can be less reactive emotionally

Who were the Desert Fathers and why did they practice in isolation?

The Desert fathers were early Christian hermits (yogis) in the Egyptian desert who practiced selflessness and generosity in isolation to have no distractions

Loving-Kindness?

Wishing that other people and our ourselves to be happy and kind

Compassion?

The desire and willingness to relieve others and yourself from suffering

Empathy?

Putting yourself in other people’s shoes (cognitive, affective/emotional, somatic/empathic concern)

Cognitive Empathy

Understand how the other thinks

Emotional/Affective Empathy

Feels what the other feel, especially their suffering

Empathic/Somatic Empathy

Having empathic concern for others/heart of compassion and taking action

The study at the Max Plank Institute showed what differences between volunteers who were taught loving-kindness and those who weren’t

Compassion volunteers showed love towards those suffering in the video, other volunteers felt the pain as if they were the victims

What is the benefit of cultivating loving concern for other people’s well-being?

They activate the brain circuitry for positive feelings, reward, and affiliation

What is metta or agape mean?

Loving-Kindness

What is most important in determining our happiness?

The mind

What is the proper attitude of a meditator?

A scientific investigator being curious, open-minded, skeptical and assesing based on hard evidence

What is the Dalai Lama’s strategy for extending loving-kindness from family to everyone (even with people we don’t like)?

We need to recognize the ‘oneness’ of humanity where everyone wants to be free from suffering. Everyone wants to be happy

In terms of neural networks, what is the difference between feelings of empathy and feelings of compassion?

Empathy = brain’s caretaking circuitry activates

Compassion = brain’s circuitry for positive feelings activate

What was the finding of the Yale study of implicit bias, comparing one group that were taught the value of loving-kindness with another group that were taught and practiced loving-kindness meditation?

Implicit bias decreased only in the group that practiced loving-kindness meditation

What is the point of the story about the student and his request of his Zen master to create a calligraphy for him, “something of great wisdom”?

Paying attention is the foundation

Do all forms of meditation involve training attention?

All forms!

What was the finding of the 1970s Japan study using a EEG machine to measure monks’ brain activity during meditation?

3 of the advanced monks' brain responded as strongly to the 20th sound as to the first because most brains tune out

Tuning out a repeated sound reflects the neural process known as ____

Habituation

What are the 5 types of attention?

Selective attention (focus on one element), Vigilance (maintain constant attention), Allocating attention (notice small shifts), Goal focus (keep a goal in mind), Meta-awareness (track the quality of one’s awareness)

What is the difference between signal and noise?

Signal = What we pay attention to

Noise = What we tune out

What does MBSR involve?

8 weeks of attention-training methods

Why is multitasking a myth?

The brain doesn’t do 2 things at once, it just switches rapidly from one task to others.

What happens in your brain when you “multi-task”

When attention returns to the original task, its strength is diminished a lot and it can take several minutes to ramp up once again to full concentration

What is the negative consequence of multi-tasking?

It affects other areas of life since we can’t filter out the noise/distractions from the signal and this creates confusion about what’s important. Our retention decreases

What is meta-awareness?

Paying intense attention to the movements of the mind

What is the “cocktail party effect”?

The brain’s ability to focus on a single voice or conversation while tuning out loud background noise

What is cognitive control?

The mental process that guides your thoughts, actions, and emotions according to your internal goals rather than just reacting to distractions or habits

What is top down processing and bottom-up processing?

Top-down = using prior knowledge to shape experience

Bottom-up = sensory input to shape perception

Most of our thoughts are of which of these types

automatic, repetitive, and negative

What is the benefit of meta-awareness?

Being aware that we are aware lets us focus on our mind without being swept away by other thoughts/feelings

What has research found regarding clinical improvements using meditation to reduce the biological causes of pain?

There is no research to date!

From where does pain relief come regarding meditation?

The relief comes in how people relate to their pain

How does MBSR help patients with fibromyalgia?

It reduces the stress of having fibromyalgia and lessens the symptoms

It is not enough to know if a person has a particular gene for diabetes. What else needs to be known?

Whether that gene is expressed (turned on or off). Exercise and not eating a lot of sugar helps to turn the gene off

Does meditation have epigenetic impacts – meaning, “down-regulating” the genes responsible for the inflammatory response?

yes

What did Davidson find regarding meditation’s effect on inflammatory genes?

He found a marked “down-regulation” after 1 day of meditation by seasoned practitioners. mental exercise, like meditation, can be a driver of benefits at the level of genes

What are telomeres?

Telomeres = Protective caps at the ends of our chromosomes

Telomerase = an enzyme that rebuilds telomeres

How does meditation affect telomeres?

Slows down the degeneration of telomeres

What did Davidson find regarding the breath rate of long-term meditators vs. non-meditators?

Long-term meditators took 1.6 breaths less each minute. they took 2,000 breaths less per day, 800,000 less breaths each year

What do the authors suggest regarding the effectiveness of meditation in treating disease and illness?

It’s unknown but it may reduce inflammation

What approach do science and meditation share?

They are both empirical processes, rooted in observation

Emotions arise in response to ____

To things that matter to us

What does Paul Ekman mean by ‘unbidden’ emotions?

Feeling that emotions happen to us, that they are outside us

From where do emotions emerge?

Products of our own minds and our own thoughts

How long do emotions last?

Emotional reactions are fast and most emotions are very brief (seconds)

When someone says, ‘I’ve been sad all day,’ what is happening to him or her emotionally?

They’re revisiting a sad experience and there is a recurring cycle of sadness

What does chakra mean?

Wheel or disk; wheels of energy throughout the body

How many chakras

7 main ones where you chant AH, OM, HUNG

Samskrit Word Samadhi

Detached Equilibrium

What are synonyms for Nirvana

Cosmic consciousness, buddha nature, christ consciousness, moksha

What are the 5 benefits of mediation?

More relaxed, makes me feel better, reduces blood pressure, improves breathing rates, helps immune system

What causes mental suffering?

Attachement or aversions

Yoga?

Unity of mind body and spirit

Buddha

The awakened one (waked in samsara, woke up to nirvana)

Samsara

The cycle of suffering.life

What are the 4 immeasurables in Buddhism

Love, Compassion, Joy, Equanimity

What are epigenetic influencers

They are environmental factors that affect your genes

What are the 3 critical areas of brain structure related to meditation and how are they affected by long-term meditators?

Prefrontal cortex, amygdala, and the insula

“He who has ears to hear; let him hear.”

A purified mind will comprehend the true significance of his teachings (but others will not)

Why did meditation become less important in Christianity?

Personal revelation undermined Church authority

What is super-conscious meditation

When you experience the essential unity of yourself with God

Rinpoche

Precious teacher

La-Ma

High mother (mother loves unconditionally)

AH

Crown Chakra

Space; connects us to openness or infinite space

sky without clouds

OM

Throat Chakra

Awareness/completeness; space and light helps us feel complete

Sun shining, no clouds

AH overcomes ___, OM overcomes ____

Fear, hope

Hung

heart chakra

4 immeasurables appear spontaneously