Our Research Group

The Meditation Research Lab

We investigate meditation and mindfulness from various perspectives. We focus on the neuroscience of meditation, aiming to pinpoint the brain processes associated with meditation as well as related cognitive and emotional functions. In addition, we pursue an applied approach, developing mindfulness-based interventions for different contexts and investigating the underlying mechanisms of change.

An important achievement of our group is that in a series of several studies we demonstrated that practicing mindful breath awareness training (M-BAT) for 10 minutes a day for only a few weeks in a row, will lead to important changes in meta-cognitive functions and corresponding changes in brain activity.

In a series of studies with an applied focus we discovered that mindfulness-based interventions that aim to improve eating behaviour may be particularly effective if they target interoceptive awareness and impulsive behavioural tendency, while promoting an accepting, non-judging awareness of own thoughts and emotions.

Our Group Members

Dr Peter Malinowski – Reader in Cognitive Neuroscience

Dr Paul Lattimore – Senior Lecturer

Rebecca Hort-Atkinson – current PhD student

Anthony Bennett – current PhD student

Former Group Members

Dr Adam Moore – former PhD student in our lab

Dr Bethan Mead – former Research Associate

Dr Naomi R. Fisher – former PhD student in our lab

Dr Joan Paul Pozuelos – former Researcher in our lab

Dr Kat Schneider – former PhD student in our lab



Our Collaborations



  

University of Wisconsin-Madison – Center for Sleep and Consciousness

Sapienza University of Rome – Department of Psychology

University of Osnabrück – Institute for Psychology

  

Bulgarian Academy of Sciences – Institute of Neurobiology

 

University of Granada – Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Lab

Athabasca University

Athabasca University, Canada – Faculty of Science and Technology

University of Sydney

The University of Sydney – Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

collaboration with Manchester Metropolitan University

Manchester Metropolitan University – Department of Life Sciences