Research

Intro: This article describes the theory behind how mindfulness taps into reward-based learning to help people overcome habitual behaviors   Abstract: Addiction is an age-old problem with desire pitted against self-control and will-power. In modern day substances (including food) and experiences (e.g. social media, internet gaming) are being increasingly engineered to get individuals “hooked.” Current … Read more

Intro: This article describes common pitfalls of traditional dieting, and how mindfulness works in a different way to help people change their relationship to eating   Abstract Emotional and other maladaptive eating behaviors develop in response to a diversity of triggers, from psychological stress to the endless external cues in our modern food environment. While … Read more

Intro: This study showed that Eat Right Now reduces craving related eating by 40%. It is the first to show that an app-based mindfulness training can decouple craving and eating (and reduce eating in response to negative emotions by 36%). Link to press release summary.   Abstract Theoretically driven smartphone-delivered behavioral interventions that target mechanisms … Read more

Intro: This is the first study comparing mindfulness training to gold-standard treatment for smoking cessation. Four months after treatment mindfulness was found to be 5x better at helping people quit smoking.   Abstract (Brewer 2011) Background: Cigarette smoking is the leading cause of preventable death in the world, and long-term abstinence rates remain modest. Mindfulness … Read more

Intro: This study investigated the psychological mechanisms of how mindfulness helps people quit smoking. It found that mindfulness helps people not act on smoking urges -to “be” with them rather than habitually react. Background Smoking is the leading cause of preventable death in the US, while abstinence rates remain modest. Smoking has been shown to be perpetuated … Read more

Intro: This is the first paper that links ancient and modern psychological mechanism together of how mindfulness works to change behavior. Abstract: Humans suffer heavily from substance use disorders and other addictions. Despite much effort that has been put into understanding the mechanisms of the addictive process, treatment strategies have remained sub-optimal over the past … Read more