Image via WikipediaThe inflammatory response to physical (and emotional) stressors has become a very hot topic in medicine, psychiatry, and neuroscience. The Wikipedia entry (click here) provides a good overview of inflammation: "Inflammation (Latin, inflammatio, to set on fire) is the complex biological response of vascular tissues to harmful stimuli, such as pathogens, damaged cells, or irritants. It is a protective attempt by the organism to remove the injurious stimuli as well as initiate the healing process for the tissue. Inflammation is not a synonym for infection... In the absence of inflammation, wounds and infections would never heal, and progressive destruction of the tissue would compromise the survival of the organism. However, inflammation which runs unchecked can also lead to a host of diseases."It is increasingly being recognized that there are intriguing parallels between physical stressors and irritants (a cut or bruise; exposure to toxic substances) and mental or emotional stressors and symptoms (traumatic events; depression). Previously I have written (here) about Dr. Charles Raison's new research into the effects of meditation (specifically, so-called "compassion meditation") on the inflammatory response process. Here is a summary of what I wrote:
Dr. Raison points out that it is important to study the possible pathways along which meditation practice is helpful for stress-related emotional and medical conditions. Likely pathways are: the autonomic nervous system, the hippocampus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, and the innate immune inflammatory system; each of these systems influences mind-body interactions that are directly relevant to health. In other words, stressful events and circumstances set off alarms within our nervous system, our endocrine system, and also in the form of an inflammatory response; and all of these can (especially if they occur frequently, or for a long time) cause havoc in our bodies and minds, contributing to or causing serious disease processes. Dr. Raison is particularly interested in seeing whether meditation results in reduced reactivity within the inflammatory pathways that are activated when we encounter psychosocial stress. In other words, it is understood within medicine that our social interactions (work and marriage!) can cause a great deal of stress, and that this stress creates inflammatory responses that can make us sick (inflammatory responses are linked to cancer, heart disease, diabetes, depression, and other diseases) In this study, participants were randomized either to training in loving-kindness meditation (Metta, or compassion meditation) or an active control group (a health discussion group). They were then subjected to an intense social stressor. Physiological measures were interleukin (IL)-6 and cortisol. Dr. Raison and his colleagues found that “meditation attenuated inflammatory reactivity to psychosocial stress [and this] may have significant health relevance [emphasis added].” In other words, the people who were trained in compassion meditation displayed a reduced inflammatory response when they underwent an emotionally stressful event.
There is also recent research on possible genetic differences that might explain the different responses people may exhibit to stressful situations. A recent report (click here) in Science Daily states that early indicators are showing some of these individual genetic differences:
"there are clinical parallels between depressive symptoms and the symptoms of certain inflammatory disorders. In findings published electronically in Molecular Psychiatry, researchers from University of Miami found [differences] in inflammation-related genes that are associated with susceptibility to major depression and antidepressant response."I find all of this incredibly intriguing, especially during a time in our culture and environment when we are seeing so many people who are exposed to (and suffering from) a wide range of traumatic events, some of them quite severe (natural disasters, war, child abuse). We need to be engaged in looking for and researching multiple modalities for the prevention and treatment of stress-related and trauma-related disorders and symptoms. And it appears that one pathway that shows promise, both for prevention and treatment, is training in meditation.
If you are interested in training in meditation, see my private practice website, KC Mindfulness (click here).
2 comments:
Thanks for sharing this information. Actually "compassion meditation" is not the same as loving-kindness (metta) meditation. For this reason we are now calling it "cognitive-based compassion training" (CBCT) to emphasize that it focuses on a cognitive restructuring of one's appraisals of situations to effect a different outlook. Its emphasis is on gaining new insights, so that one does not respond to psychosocial stress in the same way.
Lovingkindness/metta meditation, as it is commonly taught, is not focused on cognitive change, but rather on increasing positive affect towards self and others. This is a part of CBCT, but CBCT employs a much more complex and comprehensive protocol.
Interesting points, Anonymous. Without necessarily disagreeing with you, let me point out a couple of things that are relevant to your post.
First, the terms we are using (e.g., "compassion meditation," etc.) in the various disciplines in which folks are studying, teaching, and researching meditation methods are far from settled. They have many different meanings and uses. It is laudable that you are making an effort to introduce some precision in this wide-open area, and of course I am sure you recognize that it will be an uphill battle.
Second, I am not so sure that it is entirely accurate to say that the practice and teaching of metta is focused entirely on increasing positive affect, and NOT on cognitive change. In any case in which we attempt to label an intervention as being exclusively effective in the cognitive as opposed to the affective realm of functioning (or vice versa), I think it is guaranteed that we are over-simplifying, as there is tremendous overlap between the two.
It would be lovely if you offered a bit more information about "cognitive-based compassion training." I am not generally very inclined to be enthusiastic about interventions in which the hope is that individuals will gain "new insights," and I generally prefer an approach of acceptance of one's mental phenomena, including one's thoughts, rather than re-structuring of cognition. But I'd be interested in learning more about this approach.
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