Center for Healthy Minds

In a recent collaborative study across institutions, researchers developed a new framework to identify mental states during meditation. This included the focus-on-breath state and mind wandering, and estimates of how much time meditators spend in each state.

Researchers at the Center for Healthy Minds found that people who took part in the most common and widely available secular mindfulness program did not experience psychological harm at a rate higher compared to people in control groups who did not take part in the program.

A college student’s mind is constantly in motion. There are classes, homework, a social life, work, and more. But there’s growing research showing that we can all benefit from taking a few moments each day to, well, live in the moment. Center Postdoctoral Research Associate Matt Hirshberg answers questions about how mindfulness can help college students ease their mind.

A recent paper published by researchers at the Center for Healthy Minds showed that eight weeks of mindfulness training resulted in reductions in work-related stress, improvements in sleep quality, lower levels of burnout and reduced depression and anxiety in police officers.

New research from the Center points to evidence that long-term meditators may be perceived by strangers as less neurotic, more mindful, more conscientious and more comfortable in their own skin.

New research from the Center suggests that mindfulness training in experienced meditators as well as in people new to meditation does not lower certain aspects of impulsivity.