Attracting Abundance

The Law

Two Doors to Success

Happiness - XI

The expression of empathy and compassion has been a mainstay of many contemplative traditions for millennia, and some traditions have even evolved extensive methods to train these qualities. Empathy is defined here as as sharing the feelings of others, whereas compassion is a feeling of concern for another along with a desire to improve his or her well-being. Recent years has seen a gain in momentum in towards the study of mindfulness and concentration training. However it is recently that scientists have begun to study efficacy of methods that specifically train compassion as an individual's well-being, and the well-being of those around them. Studies have proved that training to increase compassion and empathy do have positive effects.

Several studies provide insight in to the brain mechanisms underlying these increases in the ability to recognize emotions and engage in helping behavior. Mascaro et al (Mascara et al, 2013, Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscince, 8(1), 48 - 55) have revealed through a study that increases in compassion are accompanied by heightened activity in ventral and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex. Since these regions are involved in the regulation of emotion and goal directed behavior, this activity might indicate that the compassion training led to the development of motivation to recognize the emotions of others. Compassion response studies have also revealed that persons engaged in greater empathy and compassion have greater connection between pre-frontal cortex and nucleus accumbens.

Neuro-scientists have begun to discover specific characteristics of the brain's function at rest, when no formal task or instruction is given and the mind is allowed to wander. When fMRI data is collected from the participants at rest (not doing any tasks) , a very reliable network of brain regions become active. Because these regions are active specifically in the absence of a task , we refer to them as the default mode network.  Connectivity between regions in this network, in the absence of explicit instruction or a task, has been found to be related to various aspects of mind wandering. (Callard et al, 2013, Frontiers in Psychology, 4(December), 891). Mason et al  (Mason et al, 2007, Science, 315(5810)) have found increased activity in several areas of default mode (including the medial prefrontal cortex and the posterior cingulate) related to an increased mind wandering reports.

Mindfulness is a construct that is receiving serious attention in scientific literature for the first time. Mindfulness is often defines as paying attention, on purpose, non-judgmentally, and when cultivated is said to promote well-being. Mindfulness is also said to be associated with  decreased attachment reflected in part by a decreased influence of wanting which may at least in part underlie the association between mindfulness and well-being. This occurs in a striking way in addictions.It has been found that individuals with greater mindfulness show decreased attachment to distracting reward-related stimuli or less prone to distraction by irrelevant emotional distractions. Strengthening attention promoting skills through mindfulness or similar type of training may decrease mind wandering and increase wee-being by transforming default mode activity.

To summarize the text of the last few posts on neuroscience of happiness and well-being  the four constituents of well being are:- 

1. sustained positive emotion, 
2. recovery from negative emotions, 
3. empathy, altruism and prosocial behavior, 
4. mindfulness.

The neural circuits that underlie each of these four constituents are partially separable, though there is some overlap. 

The pre-frontal cortex and the ventral striatum are especially important in sustained positive emotion. 

Connectivity between amygdala and pre-frontal cortex is a key node through which effective recover following a negative events is mediated.

The anterior insula and  regions of the anterior cingulate cortex are implicated in empathic response and the pre-frontal cortex - ventral striatum are critical in subserving altruistic behavior.

Mind wandering and mindfulness engage the default network that can be tected at rest. Two key nodes of the default mode - the medial pre-frontal cortex and the posterior cingulate cortex  - have both been implicated in mind wandering. These regions exhibit decreased activation during the explicit voluntary cultivation of mindfulness.

Though how these four constituents synergistically work together has not been studied , there are two very important learnings from neuroscientific evidence. The first is the identification of the four constituents that influence well-being and the second concerns the profound implication of the fact that all the circuits that have been identified as underlying these four constituents of well-being exhibit plasticity. and these can be transformed through experience and training. In essence they are controllable. 

In our subsequent posts we shall see some of the personal practices (training and transformational interventions) which we can implement to increase our positivity and well being. The posts thus far have covered the scientific evidence that poistiveness and happiness are not merely new-age terms, there is science behind these phenomena. But before that i would like to write one post on happiness of children.

Namaste

Prabir