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      Potential self-regulatory mechanisms of yoga for psychological health

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          Abstract

          Research suggesting the beneficial effects of yoga on myriad aspects of psychological health has proliferated in recent years, yet there is currently no overarching framework by which to understand yoga’s potential beneficial effects. Here we provide a theoretical framework and systems-based network model of yoga that focuses on integration of top-down and bottom-up forms of self-regulation. We begin by contextualizing yoga in historical and contemporary settings, and then detail how specific components of yoga practice may affect cognitive, emotional, behavioral, and autonomic output under stress through an emphasis on interoception and bottom-up input, resulting in physical and psychological health. The model describes yoga practice as a comprehensive skillset of synergistic process tools that facilitate bidirectional feedback and integration between high- and low-level brain networks, and afferent and re-afferent input from interoceptive processes (somatosensory, viscerosensory, chemosensory). From a predictive coding perspective we propose a shift to perceptual inference for stress modulation and optimal self-regulation. We describe how the processes that sub-serve self-regulation become more automatized and efficient over time and practice, requiring less effort to initiate when necessary and terminate more rapidly when no longer needed. To support our proposed model, we present the available evidence for yoga affecting self-regulatory pathways, integrating existing constructs from behavior theory and cognitive neuroscience with emerging yoga and meditation research. This paper is intended to guide future basic and clinical research, specifically targeting areas of development in the treatment of stress-mediated psychological disorders.

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          Most cited references125

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          Attention regulation and monitoring in meditation.

          Meditation can be conceptualized as a family of complex emotional and attentional regulatory training regimes developed for various ends, including the cultivation of well-being and emotional balance. Among these various practices, there are two styles that are commonly studied. One style, focused attention meditation, entails the voluntary focusing of attention on a chosen object. The other style, open monitoring meditation, involves nonreactive monitoring of the content of experience from moment to moment. The potential regulatory functions of these practices on attention and emotion processes could have a long-term impact on the brain and behavior.
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            Evidence for a frontoparietal control system revealed by intrinsic functional connectivity.

            Two functionally distinct, and potentially competing, brain networks have been recently identified that can be broadly distinguished by their contrasting roles in attention to the external world versus internally directed mentation involving long-term memory. At the core of these two networks are the dorsal attention system and the hippocampal-cortical memory system, a component of the brain's default network. Here spontaneous blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) signal correlations were used in three separate functional magnetic resonance imaging data sets (n = 105) to define a third system, the frontoparietal control system, which is spatially interposed between these two previously defined systems. The frontoparietal control system includes many regions identified as supporting cognitive control and decision-making processes including lateral prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, and inferior parietal lobule. Detailed analysis of frontal and parietal cortex, including use of high-resolution data, revealed clear evidence for contiguous but distinct regions: in general, the regions associated with the frontoparietal control system are situated between components of the dorsal attention and hippocampal-cortical memory systems. The frontoparietal control system is therefore anatomically positioned to integrate information from these two opposing brain systems.
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              Interoceptive inference, emotion, and the embodied self.

              The concept of the brain as a prediction machine has enjoyed a resurgence in the context of the Bayesian brain and predictive coding approaches within cognitive science. To date, this perspective has been applied primarily to exteroceptive perception (e.g., vision, audition), and action. Here, I describe a predictive, inferential perspective on interoception: 'interoceptive inference' conceives of subjective feeling states (emotions) as arising from actively-inferred generative (predictive) models of the causes of interoceptive afferents. The model generalizes 'appraisal' theories that view emotions as emerging from cognitive evaluations of physiological changes, and it sheds new light on the neurocognitive mechanisms that underlie the experience of body ownership and conscious selfhood in health and in neuropsychiatric illness. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Journal
                Front Hum Neurosci
                Front Hum Neurosci
                Front. Hum. Neurosci.
                Frontiers in Human Neuroscience
                Frontiers Media S.A.
                1662-5161
                30 September 2014
                2014
                : 8
                : 770
                Affiliations
                [1] 1Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital Boston, MA, USA
                [2] 2Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, Justus Liebig Universität Giessen Giessen, Germany
                [3] 3Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University Maastricht, Netherlands
                [4] 4Division of Sleep and Circadian Disorders, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School Boston, MA, USA
                [5] 5Department of Psychology, University of Connecticut Storrs, CT, USA
                [6] 6Department of Psychiatry, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School Boston, MA, USA
                [7] 7Institute for Extraordinary Living, Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health Stockbridge, MA, USA
                Author notes

                Edited by: Laura Schmalzl, University of California, San Diego, USA

                Reviewed by: Bessel A. Van Der Kolk, Trauma Center, USA; Jeffery Dusek, Allina Health, USA

                *Correspondence: David R. Vago, Functional Neuroimaging Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, 824 Boylston Street, Chestnut Hill, Boston, MA 02467, USA e-mail: dvago@ 123456bics.bwh.harvard.edu

                Tim Gard, Jessica J. Noggle, Crystal L. Park, David R. Vago and Angela Wilson have contributed equally to this work as part of the Kripalu Research Consortium.

                This article was submitted to the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.

                Article
                10.3389/fnhum.2014.00770
                4179745
                25368562
                aae56498-22c1-4b0f-b767-8ee084314219
                Copyright © 2014 Gard, Noggle, Park, Vago and Wilson.

                This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

                History
                : 12 May 2014
                : 11 September 2014
                Page count
                Figures: 1, Tables: 2, Equations: 0, References: 187, Pages: 20, Words: 0
                Categories
                Neuroscience
                Hypothesis and Theory Article

                Neurosciences
                yoga,self-regulation,stress,executive control,viscerosomatic,top-down,bottom-up
                Neurosciences
                yoga, self-regulation, stress, executive control, viscerosomatic, top-down, bottom-up

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