NCT01428674

Time, Touch, Attention and the Autonomic Nervous System

The Impact of Interpersonal Mindful Compassion on Autonomic Nervous System Function

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 20 (actual)
• Sponsor: Wake Forest University · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 40 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

The purpose of this study is to describe the onset, duration and dose-response of interpersonal mindful compassion on respiratory rate and heart rate variability in healthy adults in order to prepare for research evaluating the impact of this intervention in patient populations and to prepare for basic research investigating the CNS mechanisms for observed effects. Previous research has found that mindfulness meditation, including mindful compassion, results in autonomic changes in the practitioner. Emerging neuroscience of dyadic interactions suggests that through the effects of mirror neuron isopraxis, one person's physiologic state may be mirrored by another. However, no research has directly evaluated the impact of one person's mindful compassion on another person's autonomic activity. This study paves the way for an entirely new avenue of research inquiry.

Conditions

• Stress

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Interpersonal Mindful Compassion with Touch	A practitioner lightly touches the participant on the hands, arms, shoulders, lower legs and feet while extending loving kindness to the participant.
OTHER	Reading while extending loving kindness	The practitioner sits in a room with the participant, pretending to read, while extending loving kindness to the participant.

Timeline

• Start date: 2011-02-01
• Primary completion: 2011-06-01
• Completion: 2011-06-01
• First posted: 2011-09-05
• Last updated: 2018-08-15