Calm and smart? A selective review of meditation effects on decision making

By Sai Sun, Ziging Yao, Jaixin Wei, and Rongjun Yu
Summary and critique by Jillian J

Summary:
Sun et al. present a collection of empirical findings on the observed effects of mediation on decision making, empathy, and prosocial behavior. They begin by giving a general definition of meditation-- a broad variety of practices designed to cultivate emotional balance and psychological well-being, including relaxation, the observation of one's own inner or out experiences, and the intentional self-regulation of attention (Lutz et al., 2008; Slagter et al., 2001; Awasthi, 2012, as cited by Sun et al., 2015).

Sun et al. divide their collection into non-social decision making and social decision making categories. They explain that non-social decision-making research centers on individual decision that are made based on the decision maker's own beliefs. In contrast, research on social decision making focuses on interactive decisions that are made based on group choices and the preferences of others (FEhr and Camerer, 2007; Sanfey, 2007; Rilling and Sanfey, 2011, as cited by Sun et al., 2015).

The authors thoroughly outline the specific brain activity researchers have observed in subjects who meditate vs those who do not, ultimately concluding that meditation-related experience can reduce impulsivity, pathological gambling, and decision biases in non-social decision-making (Sun et al., 2015). Meditation helps to control risky responses, habitual actions, temporal focus, and negative emotions.

A few weeks ago, our class participated in a game-theoretical exercise that involved imaginary monetary payoffs and two actors who could either share or steal the money. This article referenced a similar scenario wherein researchers found meditators are more likely to accept unfair offers than non-meditators because the meditation helps regulate negative emotions or cultivates compassion during social decision making.

For non-social decision making, the authors assert that mediation may lead to better decision making by promoting better emotion regulation. The studies they collected found that decision-makers who meditated were able to reach conclusion that were more reflective of their values and objectives which allowed them to better differentiate between relevant and irrelevant information, maintain goal awareness, and mitigate irrational behaviors.

Critique:
The authors presented an inclusive and informative collection of studies on the effects of meditation on decision making. I'm skeptical of any research that finds loads of support, but decidedly less, if any, contradicting evidence. Maybe meditation really does consistently produce desirable effects for those who practice it. This article certainly leads me to believe that. But I wonder if the emotionally regulated, non-biased, thoughtful person meditation supposedly creates is always what we want. If you think your adversary is of the non-meditating variety, perhaps you'd want to have a non-meditator on your side who can provide a more accurate insight into what action the adversary is likely considering.

Mindfulness-based stress reduction effects on moral reasoning and decision making

Authors: Shauna L. Shapiro, Hooria Jazaieri and Philippe R. Goldin

Institution: Santa Clara University

Publication: Journal of Positive Psychology

Year: 2012

In this article, the authors want to understand whether mindfulness training influences the development of moral reasoning, and therefore better and ethical decision-making abilities.

The authors cite Shapiro and Carlson’s (2009) definition of mindfulness as “the awareness that arises through intentionally paying attention in an open, kind and discerning way.” The authors state that “mindfulness practices are designed to enhance awareness of thoughts, feelings, somatic sensations, intention/motivations, and behaviors. The authors follow by citing the available research showing that mindfulness has pronounced psychological and physiological effects on both clinical and non-clinical populations.

The authors believe there is a link between moral reasoning and mindfulness. This is due to moral reasoning having a foundation in awareness. The core principle behind mindfulness practices is that it makes the practitioner more aware and attentive to himself, his surroundings, and the present moment. If moral reasoning has a basis in awareness, then mindfulness showed have a deeper impact on the other factors involved in moral reasoning.

The believed effect that mindfulness should have on ethical decision-making is due to the deconstruction of the ego involved in mindfulness training. By creating a more objective frame of reference, the mindfulness practitioner will have a broader awareness and understanding of not just himself but also others.

The authors hypothesize that Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction would result in improved moral reasoning and decision-making in the immediate period following the study as well as a two-month follow-up.

25 adult females were involved in the study. The study consisted of an eight-week training in MBSR, which included 20 hours of meditation practice. Participants were required to record their experience in a daily journal. The participants were taught several mindfulness techniques.

The immediate results of the study found that there was no difference from the baseline in moral reasoning. The study did find that participants showed significant improvements in all measures of mindfulness.

The two-month follow-up showed continued improvements in mindfulness. In contrast to the immediate results of the study, participants showed improvement in all domains of moral reasoning in the follow-up. The authors believe that could be associated with more practice in MBSR which they posit would yield even greater positive changes in moral reasoning. The authors found that the amount of MBSR practiced by the participants was not associated with moral reasoning and other tested domains. Only mindfulness was enhanced through an increase in the weekly time devoted to practicing MBSR. Additionally, changes in mindfulness between the immediate post-study survey and two-month follow-up were not related to changes in moral reasoning.

Critique:

It’s clear that consistent mindfulness training has an impact on thinking parameters. While the authors tested their domains using cognitive and psychological scales, they did not do so decision-making scenarios. Therefore, there are significant limitations on the applicability of their findings. The authors note that their study represents a starting off point for further research in the area. Their study indicates that there is some noticeable benefit towards continued practice of MBSR techniques, no matter how much time spent on a weekly basis. Given that there were improvements at the two-month mark in moral reasoning, based on scales used, it would be safe to say that there may be some benefit for analysts to practice MBSR. If moral reasoning and mindfulness can be thought as a proxy for unbiased or balanced analytic thought, then regular practice of MBSR should have noticeable, consistent, and long-term effect and potentially substantial positive benefit in estimates and analytic judgement. An additional limitation to this study was that it included only a small sample size and the sample subjects consisted only of women. The authors assess that women and men may internalize and respond to MBSR training differently. Given that the ranks of the Intelligence Community has predominantly been made up of men, this has implications on whether meditation is only useful on both genders. Given a brief review of other literature it is highly likely that MBSR is useful for men and women, therefore meditation could be explored as a practical method to improve analysis. 

 Link: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17439760.2012.723732

Debiasing the Mind Through Meditation: Mindfulness and the Sunk-Cost Bias

Debiasing the Mind Through Meditation: Mindfulness and the Sunk-Cost Bias

By Hafenbrack, A. C., Kinias, Z., & Barsade, S. G.

Summary & Critique by Billy

Summary:

Introduction

The authors begin their paper by defining both mindfulness meditation as well as sunk-cost bias.  Mindfulness meditation is the practice of focus and awareness of the present while eliminating thoughts of the past and the future.  A typical execution of mindfulness meditation is simply focusing on one’s breathing and how the body feels with each inhale and exhale over a short period of time.

To define sunk-cost bias, Hafenbrack et al. citing (Arkes & Blumer, 1985) state that it is the tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort or time has been made (Hafenbrack et al., 2013).  The authors suggest mindfulness could have an impact on increasing resistance to sunk-cost bias due to the emotional and temporal processes involved in the decision making.  Further discussion occurs regarding prior research on how a past/future mindset, as well as negative emotions, can increase sunk-cost bias.  This discussion further suggests a relationship between mindfulness meditation and sunk-cost bias with supporting research on mindfulness meditation’s ability to increase a person’s subjective well being and decrease negative emotion.

Hafenbrack et al. conducted four studies testing their hypothesis that mindful meditation would increase resistance to sunk-cost bias. 

Study 1

This was a correlational study between trait mindfulness and resistance to the sunk-cost bias.  They used two control factors to test this, age and self-esteem.  They hypothesized that greater trait mindfulness would predict an increased resistance to sunk-cost bias (Hafenbrack et al, 2014).  The researchers had 187 adults complete the mindful attention awareness scale as well as the Resisting Sunk Costs section of the Adult Decision-Making Competence Inventory.  Self-esteem was controlled for by having participants complete the Rosenberg Self-Esteem scale.  The researchers determined that trait mindfulness was positively correlated with resisting the sunk cost bias (r = .205, p = .003) (Hafenbrack et al., 2013).  When entering age, self-esteem and trait mindfulness as independent variables in a linear regression model they determined that age and trait mindfulness were significant predictors of resisting the sunk-cost bias, but self-esteem was not (Hafenbreck et al., 2013). 

Study 2a and 2b

Both studies tested the relationship between state mindfulness and the sunk cost bias.  In both studies, participants either underwent a 15-minute mindfulness meditation session focused on breathing or were part of a control group that underwent a 15-minute mind wandering induction, that emphasized allowing their mind to wander. After each session was complete participants were then presented with a sunk-cost scenario, with a differing scenario for 2a and 2b.  In each scenario, the subject’s perspective was that of a key decision maker at a company.  Each scenario provided a background regarding an initial investment made by their company for a product, and that after the investment was made, it was brought to their attention that their investment was inferior to another product.  The participants then had to decide to continue with their initial investment, which would indicate sunk-cost bias or to give up on their initial investment.

Both studies concluded that mindfulness meditation increased participants resistance to sunk-cost bias.

2a: 78% in the meditation group resisted bias compared to 44% who resisted in the control group.

2b: 53% in the meditation group resisted bias compared to the 29% who resisted in the control group.

Study3

This study was an experiment looking at decreased temporal focus on the future/past and decreased state negative affect as the underlying mechanisms that make mindful meditation effective.  The study was an online survey that utilized similar 15-minute recorded induction focused on breathing.  This was followed by multiple survey questions to measure resistance to sunk-cost bias, temporal focus, and positive/negative affect. This data was input into three bootstrapping mediation tests.  Hafenbreck et al concluded that mindfulness meditation decreased temporal focus on the past and future which in turn reduced negative affect and led to greater resistance to sunk-cost bias (Hafenbreck et al, 2013). 

Critique:

I think that this article was insightful regarding the power of meditation.  The fact that they were able to provide multiple relevant studies that support meditation as a tool to improve decision making with significant empirical evidence.  Their studies used only a single and short 15-minute session of meditation.  They noted that this was more practical to existing studies that utilized 8 weeks of meditation training.  I would like to see if there is a diminishing returns aspect to meditation and its ability to improve resistance to sunk-cost bias.  Also, research into how meditation can impact creating more accurate estimates would be an interesting next step.

Hafenbrack, A. C., Kinias, Z., & Barsade, S. G. (2013). Debiasing the Mind Through Meditation: Mindfulness and the Sunk-Cost Bias. Psychological Science, 25(2), 369–376. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/e873/6e9e42cc02648451e5c7a736cd5cef8e1515.pdf?_ga=2.172856483.1278782003.1539440196-1022806752.1539440196

Summary of Findings: Role Playing (3 out of 5 Stars)

 Note: This post represents the synthesis of the thoughts, procedures and experiences of others as represented in the articles read in advance (see previous posts) and the discussion among the students and instructor during the Advanced Analytic Techniques class at Mercyhurst University, in October 2018 regarding Role Playing as an Analytic Method, specifically. This technique was evaluated based on its overall validity, simplicity, flexibility and its ability to effectively use unstructured data.

Description:

Role playing is the act of embodying a character or the behavior of someone who is different from yourself. In an intelligence capacity, role playing is meant to help understand the behavior of a particular adversary, person, or organization of interest in general and how they are likely to act in a given situation. Role playing draws on similar fundamentals as red-teaming and devil’s advocacy but involves more immersive preparation by the analyst into understanding and subsequently ‘becoming’ the person or organization.

Strengths:

• There are indications that it is effective at forecasting events
• May provide insight into the thought processes of individuals and organizations
• Prepares for real-life situations
• Understanding of operational environment
• Effective for teaching

Weaknesses:  

• Requires sufficient time to execute a role playing exercise

• Preparation time for the exercise itself is included in the overall time required to execute the exercise.
• Repetition of the exercise or running multiple exercises concurrently may unveil more potential outcomes
• Requires sufficient knowledge of the individual(s), organization(s), and scenario(s) to effectively create the world of the exercise
• Some individuals are more predisposed to fit into roles easily, others do not and therefore requires more time to become the role assigned

How-To:

1. Immerse yourself into the role of given character
2. Immerse your character into the environment of the given situation
3. Introduce the other characters involved in the scenario

1. The actors of these characters will also complete steps 1 & 2
3. Allow time for characters to identify courses of action for scenario
4. Repeat multiple times (if possible)

**To capture the process of the methodology, it may be beneficial to implement a pre-test of assumptions, as well as a debriefing after the simulation.  This will allow analysts to understand how role-playing shaped their final analysis.

Application of Technique:

Activity Materials:

Characters*: 11 cards, face down, each with a different “character” (e.g. coach, mom, alien, mime, child, etc.)

Modifiers*: 11 cards, face down, each with a different “modifier” (e.g. who is disgruntled, who is late for work, who has food poisoning, etc.)

Motivations*: 11 cards, face down, each with a different “motivation” (e.g. who needs to blow their nose, who wants to quit their job, who can’t find their car, who is trying to escape the apocalypse, etc.)

Lines*: 6 cards, face down, each with a different line (e.g. what time is it, can I bum a cigarette, have a nice day, etc. )

*the number of cards is arbitrary. We had enough option for each participant.

Activity:

Participant picks a “character” card and looks at the card. Without speaking, s/he walks across the room embodying that character. Participant then picks a “modifier” card. Without speaking, s/he walks across the room embodying that character, now considering how that modifier changes the way s/he physically portrays the character. Participant picks a “motivation” card. Without speaking s/he walks across the room embodying that character, considering the modifier and now the motivation. Participant should be aware of how these additional pieces of information are influencing the way s/he moves across the room. Finally, participant picks a “line” card. This time, s/he walks across the room, keeping in mind the character, modifier, and motivation, but now delivering the line at any point.

Concept:

This exercise allows participants to practice rapid character study. The purpose of not speaking in the first 3 steps is to teach participants the importance of actions and physicality. Building a character and successfully role playing demands that the participants study and collect information about their character before playing the role--in the case of this exercise, before delivering the line.  

For Further Information:

1. The Conversation Analytic Role-play Method (CARM)
2. Using the Conversation Analytic Role-Play Method in healthcare interpreter education