Differential effects on pain intensity and unpleasantness of two meditation practices.
Open accessAbstract
Pain is an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience that can be regulated by many different cognitive mechanisms. We compared the regulatory qualities of two different meditation practices during noxious thermal stimuli: Focused Attention, directed at a fixation cross away from the stimulation, which could regulate negative affect through a sensory gating mechanism; and Open Monitoring, which could regulate negative affect through a mechanism of nonjudgmental, nonreactive awareness of sensory experience. Here, we report behavioral data from a comparison between novice and long-term meditation practitioners (long-term meditators, LTMs) using these techniques. LTMs, compared to novices, had a significant reduction of self-reported unpleasantness, but not intensity, of painful stimuli while practicing Open Monitoring. No significant effects were found for FA. This finding illuminates the possible regulatory mechanism of meditation-based clinical interventions like Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR). Implications are discussed in the broader context of training-induced changes in trait emotion regulation.
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Reduced cognitive elaboration of the sensory experience of pain through meditation has been shown to decrease pain unpleasantness.
“Indeed, reduced cognitive elaboration of the sensory experience of pain through meditation has been shown to decrease pain unpleasantness (Perlman et al., 2010).”
From Therapeutic mechanisms of a mindfulness-based treatment for IBS: effects on visceral sensitivity, catastrophizing, and affective processing of pain sensations. (2012) · cites this paper as Perlman et al., 2010
The Discussion reports reduced pain-unpleasantness ratings in long-term meditators practicing open monitoring. It says the results “appear to support” reduced cognitive elaboration as an explanation; it does not establish that mechanism as the cause, as the citing sentence implies. No page number is available in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.86)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredAfter brief training of under a week, meditation significantly lowers both pain intensity and unpleasantness ratings.
“While meditation after brief training (less than 1 week) produces significant reductions in pain intensity and unpleasantness ratings,20, 21, 23, 122, 142”
From Mindfulness meditation-based pain relief: a mechanistic account (2016) · cites this paper as [122]
Long-term meditation does not alter pain intensity but does affect the unpleasantness component of self-reported pain.
“long-term meditation does not produce changes/differences in pain intensity but rather influences the unpleasantness dimension of self-reported pain.17, 121, 122”
From Mindfulness meditation-based pain relief: a mechanistic account (2016) · cites this paper as [122]
In nearly all mindfulness/pain experiments, the unpleasantness aspect of pain is reduced significantly more than pain intensity.
“Furthermore, across almost all mindfulness/pain–focused experiments, the unpleasantness dimension of pain was significantly more attenuated with respect to pain intensity,16–21, 23, 121, 122”
From Mindfulness meditation-based pain relief: a mechanistic account (2016) · cites this paper as [122]
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References 43 · Cited by 202
- Authors
- Perlman, D. M., Salomons, T. V., Davidson, R. J., & Lutz, A.
- Affiliations
- University of Wisconsin–Madison (US)
- Venue
- Emotion
- Published
- 2010
- Volume
- 10
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 65-71
- ISSN
- 1528-3542 (ISSN-L)
- 1931-1516
- PMC
- PMC2859822
- OpenAlex
- W2126710945
- Cited by
- 202
- References
- 43
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 12 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 8 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 15 · 2020: 14 · 2019: 14 · 2018: 16 · 2017: 12 · 2016: 9 · 2015: 17 · 2014: 11 · 2013: 15 · 2012: 21
- FWCI
- 18.05
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Emotion (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of Mental Health (P50-MH069315)
- National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (P01-AT004952, U01-AT002114)
- Mental Insight Foundation
- John W. Kluge Foundation
- National Institutes of Health (T32-MH018931)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Mindfulness and Compassion Interventions
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Pain Management and Placebo Effect
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Psychiatry and Mental health › Psychosomatic Disorders and Their Treatments
- Keywords
- meditation, pain intensity, pain unpleasantness, focused attention, mindfulness, long-term meditators, novice meditators, sensory gating, negative affect regulation, trait emotion regulation, mindfulness-based stress reduction
- MeSH terms
- Attention, Cognition, Emotions, Female, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Pain Measurement, Stress, Psychological, Case-Control Studies, Pain Threshold, Meditation
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