Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

Studies investigating the effects of focused attention (FA) meditation on mismatch negativity (MMN) have produced inconsistent and conflicting findings, highlighting the need for well-powered studies exploring different meditation styles to fully understand MMN modulation. Addressing methodological concerns from prior research, the current study specifically examines expertise in mantra meditation, a form of focused attention meditation, utilizing a sufficiently powered investigation with an intensity MMN paradigm. This paradigm incorporates both louder and quieter deviant stimuli to assess the impact of meditation expertise and to discern whether meditation-induced MMN effects reflect higher-order cognitive processes or result from sensory adaptation. While the results suggest a trend of higher MMN in novices compared to experts, statistical significance was not achieved. The modest effect observed is likely due to using novices as an active control group, benefiting from enhanced attention skills fostered by the repetitive speech and rhythmic nature inherent in mantra meditation. The consistent unidirectional polarity shift in event-related potential (ERP) responses to both types of deviant stimuli implies that intensity-related MMN effects may not solely depend on loudness-dependent modulation of sensory components but could signify higher-order deviance detection. Complementary findings from eLORETA source localization indicate consistent bilateral temporal and frontal cortex activity, with lower amplitudes observed in the expert mantra meditator group compared to novices.