Examining Mindfulness Meditation Focused-Attention With the MBAS and Solving Anagrams
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Date
2017-05
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The Ohio State University
Abstract
As part of a programmatic line of research, we examined whether a brief mindfulness meditation training with the Meditation Breath Attention Scores (MBAS; Frewen, Evans, Maraj, Dozois, & Partridge, 2008: Frewen, Lundberg, MacKinley, & Wrath, 2011) enhanced anagram-solving performance. Current results replicated earlier findings of improved anagram performance following the MBAS. Participants solved two sets of 15 anagrams separated by the MBAS. We randomized students into either an MBAS-expectancy or MBAS-no expectancy condition. In order to examine the effects of our expectancy manipulation on anagram solving performance, those in our MBAS-expectancy group were told that they would be able to solve anagrams “more quickly and accurately” on trial 2. Unexpectedly, students in our expectancy condition did not provide higher estimates for the number of anagrams they would solve on trial 2. Participants solved more anagrams on trial 2 across both conditions relative to trial 1. Our results provide additional support for the MBAS as a brief mindfulness training method to improve performance on solving anagrams.
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Keywords
Mindfulness meditation, Focused-attention, Solving anagrams, Expectancy, MBAS