Consciousness and Cognition 51 (2017) 157–165

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Consciousness and Cognition

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/concog

Mindfulness and mind wandering: The protective effects of brief

meditation in anxious individuals
MARK
⁎
Mengran Xua, , Christine Purdona, Paul Selib, Daniel Smileka
a
Department of Psychology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
b
Department of Psychology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA

AR TI CLE I NF O AB S T R A CT

Keywords: Mind wandering can be costly, especially when we are engaged in attentionally demanding tasks.
Mindfulness Preliminary studies suggest that mindfulness can be a promising antidote for mind wandering,
Mindfulness meditation albeit the evidence is mixed. To better understand the exact impact of mindfulness on mind
Mind wandering wandering, we had a sample of highly anxious undergraduate students complete a sustained-
Sustained attention
attention task during which off-task thoughts including mind wandering were assessed.
Anxiety
Attentional focus
Participants were randomly assigned to a meditation or control condition, after which the
Present-moment awareness sustained-attention task was repeated. In general, our results indicate that mindfulness training
may only have protective effects on mind wandering for anxious individuals. Meditation
prevented the increase of mind wandering over time and ameliorated performance disruption
during off-task episodes. In addition, we found that the meditation intervention appeared to
promote a switch of attentional focus from the internal to present-moment external world,
suggesting important implications for treating worrying in anxious populations.

1. Introduction

Mind wandering accounts for almost half of our daily stream of consciousness (Killingsworth & Gilbert, 2010). A thought is
identified as signifying mind wandering when it is: (1) unrelated to the current task, and (2) decoupled from the external
environment (Stawarczyk, Majerus, Maquet, & D'Argembeau, 2011). For example, while writing an algebra exam in a large
gymnasium, a thought about lemon pie would constitute mind wandering because it is both unrelated to the exam and independent of
the external environment. Intuitively, we all know that mind wandering can cause us to make errors on important tasks (e.g., mailing
an envelope without its contents), and consistent with this intuition, a considerable amount of research has demonstrated that mind
wandering disrupts performance on numerous tasks that require focused attention (for a review see Mooneyham & Schooler, 2013).
For example, mind wandering has been associated with an increased risk of injury and death while driving (Knowles & Tay, 2002),
difficulties in educational settings (Seli, Wammes, Risko, & Smilek, in press), increased response variability in tasks assessing
sustained attention (Seli, Carriere, Levene, & Smilek, 2013), and impaired performance in everyday life (McVay, Kane, & Kwapil,
2009).
Hence, there is an imperative need for strategies that not only reduce the occurrence of mind wandering but also ameliorate its
disruptive impact on performance (Mooneyham & Schooler, 2013). A logical starting point is to investigate strategies that enhance
mindfulness, a mental state that is, by definition, characterized by the absence of mind wandering. Mindfulness is commonly defined
as “paying attention in a particular way, on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally” (Kabat-Zinn, 1994, p. 4). If mind

⁎
Corresponding author at: Department of Psychology, University of Waterloo, 200 University Avenue West, Waterloo, Ontario N2L 3G1, Canada.
E-mail address: [email protected] (M. Xu).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2017.03.009
Received 23 September 2016; Received in revised form 2 March 2017; Accepted 26 March 2017
1053-8100/ © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
M. Xu et al. Consciousness and Cognition 51 (2017) 157–165

wandering is a state characterized by the occurrence of task-unrelated and stimulus-independent thoughts (Stawarczyk, Majerus,
Maquet, & D'Argembeau, 2011), then mindfulness, a state characterized by thoughts centred on the “here and now”, should be
considered its opposite.
Indeed, research has found that individuals low in trait mindfulness report higher rates of mind wandering in everyday life
(Carriere, Seli, & Smilek, 2013; Seli, Carriere, & Smilek, 2015). Meanwhile, several clinical trials have demonstrated that mindfulness-
based therapy is effective in the reduction of both rumination and worry (i.e., a form of mind wandering) (for a review see
Querstret & Cropley, 2013). Despite these promising results, only a handful of studies have directly examined the impact of
mindfulness training on mind wandering in a controlled experimental setting and research evidence is mixed. While mindfulness
training appeared to be generally beneficial for unselected, healthy populations, it only exhibited protective effects for individuals
with high negative affect.
Several studies have demonstrated that mindfulness training can reduce the frequency of mind wandering and ameliorate its
disruptive impact on performance in general populations. In one such study (Mrazek, Franklin, Phillips, Baird, & Schooler, 2013),
university students who were given two weeks of mindfulness training showed improved performance on a GRE test and a working
memory test, and reported less mind wandering during completion of both measures. In another study (Morrison, Goolsarran,
Rogers, & Jha, 2014), university students who were given seven weeks of mindfulness training demonstrated higher response
accuracy and reported more on-task thoughts during the Sustained Attention to Response Task (SART; Robertson, Manly, Andrade,
Baddeley, & Yiend, 1997). Similar results were revealed in more recent studies. Jazaieri et al. (2016) had a community sample
complete a nine-week compassion meditation program, which led to significant reductions in their daily experience of mind
wandering. Zanesco et al. (2016) conduced two studies in which unselected participants were given an intensive, residential
mindfulness training for either one or three months and observed that participants engaged in less mind wandering and less mindless
reading after training. Shorter mindfulness training delivered similar benefits. University students who practiced eight minutes of
mindful breathing showed fewer attentional lapses during the SART, compared to those who received passive relaxation or a reading
task (Mrazek, Smallwood, & Schooler, 2012).
However, for individuals experiencing high negative affect, available studies have only shown protective effects of mindfulness
training on mind wandering. Jha et al. (2015) had two military cohorts complete eight weeks of either didactic-focused or practice-
focused mindfulness training during a high-demand interval of pre-deployment training, while a third military cohort and a civilian
sample received no training and served as control groups. Mindfulness training did not improve performance on the SART but
prevented attentional lapses from increasing over the course of pre-deployment training, with the practice-focused intervention group
outperforming the didactic-focused group (Jha et al., 2015). In a similar study, Jha, Stanley, Kiyonaga, Wong, and Gelfand (2010)
delivered eight weeks of mindfulness training with daily practice to a military cohort during a stressful pre-deployment interval,
while another pre-deployment military cohort and a civilian sample served as control groups. Results indicated that mindfulness
training prevented degradations in working memory over the pre-deployment interval. However, this protective effect was only
present for those who spent more time practicing mindfulness. The same results were replicated in a study conducted by Banks,
Welhaf, and Srour (2015). Participants who received one week of mindfulness training (15 min of guided practice plus daily home
practice) showed no increase in working memory or decrease in mind wandering as measured during the working memory test.
However, mindfulness training prevented working memory from decreasing following experimentally induced stress. It was
concluded that mindfulness training was effective in reducing the negative impact of mind wandering only at low to moderate levels
of negative affect (Banks et al., 2015).
Therefore, research has rendered mixed results on the specific impact of mindfulness on mind wandering. For the general
population, mindfulness training appears to be effective in reducing the occurrence of mind wandering and improving task
performance, regardless of its intensity. In contrast, for individuals experiencing high negative affect, mindfulness training did not
reduce the occurrence of mind wandering and only prevented performance degradations. Taken together, existing research suggests
that the extent to which mindfulness is effective in reducing mind wandering might be conditional on the characteristics of its target
population. Mindfulness training only demonstrated protective effects for individuals encountering high stress either in real life (Jha
et al., 2010, 2015) or in a laboratory setting (Banks et al., 2015). Unfortunately, research on this topic is limited and no conclusion
can be drawn at this point.
People who are high in trait anxiety experience high levels of negative affect. However, to the best of our knowledge, no published
study has investigated the effectiveness of mindfulness as a remedy for mind wandering in anxious people. Given anxious individuals
tend to experience more off-task thoughts and have greater difficulty managing their wandering minds (for a review see Aldao,
Nolen-Hoeksema, & Schweizer, 2010), it is particularly important to examine the extent to which mindfulness training is beneficial
for this population. Moreover, research of this kind would provide more insight into the hypothesis that mindfulness training only has
prophylactic effects for individuals experiencing high stress (Banks et al., 2015).
Despite some encouraging findings from recent studies, research examining the impact of mindfulness on mind wandering is still
in a preliminary stage. The underlying mechanism(s) by which mindfulness attenuates mind wandering is left entirely to speculation.
One promising line of research focuses on motivational states (Unsworth & McMillan, 2013). Recent research from our lab suggests
that higher motivation to succeed on a laboratory task was associated with less mind wandering and better performance (Seli,
Cheyne, Xu, Purdon, & Smilek, 2015). Given the absence of research linking mindfulness to motivation, the current study served as an
attempt to explore this possible association.
The goal of the current study was to: (1) examine whether a brief mindfulness meditation would have protective effects on mind
wandering among anxious individuals, and (2) explore the extent to which mindfulness might influence one’s motivational states. In
particular, undergraduate students high in trait anxiety completed two blocks of the Metronome Response Task (MRT), which

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required them to respond (via key-press) synchronously with a series of tones. In between the two MRT blocks, participants either
practiced mindfulness meditation or listened to an audiobook for ten minutes. It was hypothesized that: (1) mindfulness meditation
would prevent mind wandering from increasing; (2) mindfulness meditation would ameliorate performance disruption during
episodes of mind wandering; and (3) mindfulness meditation would result in changes to motivational states.

2. Method

2.1. Participants

During the first month of the academic term, a total number of 2551 undergraduate students from the University of Waterloo
underwent a mass testing procedure, in which they completed a large set of various questionnaires for partial course credits. Among
these questionnaires, the State-Trait Inventory for Cognitive and Somatic Anxiety-Trait (STICSA; Ree, French, MacLeod, & Locke,
2008) was the only scale that was intended for this study. Based on their responses to the STICSA, only those with a minimum total
score of 43 were invited to participate in this study, which was suggested as an optimal cut-off score for identifying clinical anxiety
(Van Dam, Gros, Earleywine, & Antony, 2013). In total, 713 undergraduate students were eligible to participate in the present study
and 91 of them gave informed consent and completed all study procedures in exchange for course credits.
Out of the original 91 participants, data from five participants were discarded because they had difficulty staying focused during
the study. We also discarded data from two participants in the meditation group who reported having previous meditation experience
and two other participants with outlying scores on mean response time (more than two standard deviations from the mean). There
were 82 participants (55 females) with complete data for analyses, with a mean age of 20.0 years (SD = 1.8). Participants were
randomly assigned to either the meditation group (N = 42; all novices) or the control group (N = 40). Analyses showed no
significant difference between two groups in trait anxiety, trait mindfulness, or baseline mood states (all ps > 0.07). Participants in
the meditation group were slightly younger (M = 19.57, SD = 1.66) than those in the control group (M = 20.43, SD = 1.95),
p < 0.05. However, there was no significant correlation between age and the frequency of off-task thoughts (p > 0.56). Therefore,
age was not included in the following analyses. The protocol received ethical clearance from the Office of Research Ethics at the
University of Waterloo.

2.2. Self-report measures

2.2.1. State-trait inventory for cognitive and somatic anxiety-trait

In the beginning of the academic term, participants completed the STICSA (Ree et al., 2008) as part of a mass-testing procedure.
The STICSA contains 21 items measuring general trait anxiety. Participants rated to what extent they agreed with each statement on a
4-point Likert scale (from 1 “not at all” to 4 “very much so”). This measure has demonstrated good validity and reliability in clinical
samples (Gros, Antony, Simms, & McCabe, 2007). We included the STICSA to pre-select participants who were high in trait anxiety.

2.2.2. Mindfulness attention awareness scale

At the beginning of the experiment, participants completed the Mindfulness Attention Awareness Scale (MAAS; Brown & Ryan,
2003). The MAAS contains 15 items measuring awareness of attention in everyday life. Participants rated the frequency at which they
failed to sustain awareness of attention on a 6-point Likert scale (from 1 “almost always” to 6 “almost never”). This measure has
demonstrated satisfactory psychometric properties (MacKillop & Anderson, 2007). The MAAS was included to rule out the possibility
of any between-group difference in trait mindfulness at baseline.

2.2.3. Positive and negative affect schedule

Participants completed the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS; Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988) both at baseline and
before the experiment concluded. The PANAS consists of 20 items measuring mood states (i.e., how the individual is feeling at the
moment). This schedule generates two subscales: one measuring positive affect and the other measuring negative affect (10 items per
scale). Using a 5-point Likert scale (from 1 “very slightly or not at all” to 5 “extremely”), participants rated the extent to which their
feeling was consistent with each item. The PANAS has demonstrated good validity and internal consistency in a large sample
(Crawford & Henry, 2004). The PANAS was included to assess changes in mood states throughout the experiment.

2.3. Mindfulness intervention

Participants in the meditation group listened to an audio recording of “Mindfulness of body and breath” (Williams & Penman,
2011), which instructed them to focus their attention on breathing and remain open-minded to their experience. This exercise was
designed for novices and has been used extensively in experimental studies on mindfulness (Erisman & Roemer, 2010; Kramer,
Weger, & Sharma, 2013).

2.4. Control intervention

Participants in the control group were asked to sit quietly. The first eight paragraphs of the first chapter (“An unexpected party”)
from an audiobook version of JRR Tolkien’s “The Hobbit” (Inglis, 2012) were then played through speakers. We used a narrated story

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because the extent to which this story required auditory attention was comparable to the mindfulness exercise. Moreover, “The
Hobbit” has been used as the control condition in several studies on mindfulness (Johnson, Gur, David, & Currier, 2013; Kramer et al.,
2013). The control group reported a proportion of intervention-related thoughts that was equivalent to that of the meditation group
at post-test (p = 0.87), verifying that there was indeed comparable engagement across both the mindfulness and control conditions.

2.5. The Metronome Response Task (MRT)

The MRT (Seli, Cheyne, & Smilek, 2013) is a sustained-attention task in which participants have to respond to a periodic
metronome tone presented through the speakers. On each MRT trial, participants were presented with 650 ms of silence, followed by
a metronome tone lasting 75 ms, and then another 575 ms of silence. Participants were instructed to press the spacebar in synchrony
with the metronome so that their key-press was made at the exact time at which each metronome tone was presented. Participants
completed two blocks of the MRT on a computer using the E-Prime software (Psychology Software Tools, 2007) and there were 250
trials in each block.

2.6. Thought probes

To obtain real-time measures of mind wandering, we intermittently presented “thought probes” throughout the MRT. These
probes are simply task interruptions that require participants to report on their mental state in the moments just prior to the
presentation of each probe. One probe was randomly presented within every set of fifty MRT trials. Hence, there were five thought
probes in each MRT. Upon the presentation of each thought probe, the MRT temporarily stopped and the computer gave the prompt:
“what was the thought you were having just prior to this moment”. Participants were to type their thought(s), verbatim. Next,
participants provided three separate reports of motivation using a 9-point Likert scale from 1 (no motivation at all) to 9 (very strong
motivation): (1) “how motivated were you to think about this thought”; (2) “how motivated were you to avoid thinking about this
thought”; and (3) “how motivated were you to perform well on this task”.
Three independent judges were recruited to code reported thoughts. Each thought was rated on task-relatedness (i.e., whether the
thought was directly related to completing the task or the nature of the task) and stimulus-dependency (i.e., whether the thought
referred to an external stimulus or a physical sensation in the current environment) using established criteria (Stawarczyk, Majerus,
Maquet et al., 2011). Each thought was then assigned to one of four categories: (1) on-task thoughts (task-related and stimulus-
dependent, e.g., “focusing on the metronome”); (2) task-related interferences (TRIs; task-related and stimulus-independent, e.g.,
“what is the purpose of this study”); (3) external distractions (EDs; task-unrelated and stimulus-dependent, e.g., “the screen is a little
dirty”); and (4) mind wandering (task-unrelated and stimulus-independent, e.g., “thinking of tomorrow’s studying plan”). In addition,
we collapsed data across TRIs, EDs, and mind wandering, as they all represent off-task thoughts (i.e., thoughts that are not on-task).
Inter-rater reliability (Cohen’s kappa) ranged from 0.69 to 0.92, suggesting satisfactory reliability across coders. Inter-rater averages
were calculated and significant discrepancies were resolved through discussion.

2.7. MRT measures

The Rhythmic Response Time (RRT) was first calculated as the difference between the time of the key-press and the onset of the
metronome tone. A higher RRT variance indicates less synchronous responding, which in turn reflects poorer performance (Seli,
Carriere et al., 2015). As variance data from the MRT was highly skewed in the positive direction, we followed established procedures
and adjusted RRT variance using a natural logarithm transform (see Seli, Cheyne et al., 2013). Mean RRT variance was calculated by
using a moving window of the current and preceding four trials across all trials except the very first five trials and the five trials
following each thought probe. We also calculated RRT variance for the five trials immediately preceding each category of thought
reports: (1) on-task RRT variance; (2) TRIs RRT variance; (3) EDs RRT variance; and (4) mind wandering RRT variance.

2.8. Procedure

Participants were tested individually. Participants first completed the MAAS and the PANAS, and were then randomly assigned to
either the meditation or control condition. Following this assignment, participants completed the first block of the MRT (pre-test).
Upon completion, they were invited to an adjacent, quieter room and listened to a ten-minute audio recording (either meditation or
audiobook) in the presence of a research assistant. Participants were instructed to follow along the audio recording as best as they
could. After the intervention, participants performed the second block of the MRT (post-test) and completed the PANAS again. In
total, the whole procedure lasted roughly 50 min.

3. Results

3.1. Did mindfulness meditation prevent the occurrence of mind wandering from increasing?

The proportions of each of the thought categories at pre-test and post-test are presented in Table 1. Separate mixed ANOVA
analyses were performed on each dependent variable, in which the proportion of thought report was tested as a function of time (pre-
test vs. post-test), condition (meditation vs. control), or their interaction. For the proportion of on-task reports, the mixed ANOVA

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Table 1
Proportions of thought reports and MRT performance.

Measures Meditation group (N = 42) Control group (N = 40)

N Pre-test Post-test t N Pre-test Post-test t

Proportions of thought reports

On-task% 42 17.14 (20.99) 10.95 (17.22) 1.57 40 19.00 (23.07) 7.50 (14.81) 3.78***
Off-task% 42 82.86 (20.99) 87.62 (17.64) −1.24 40 80.50 (23.75) 90.50 (16.94) −3.29**
TRIs% 42 7.62 (13.22) 6.67 (13.00) 0.33 40 9.50 (16.32) 9.50 (19.21) 0.00
EDs% 42 30.95 (29.03) 38.10 (25.30) −1.46 40 36.00 (27.25) 26.00 (25.30) 2.38*
MW% 42 44.29 (29.81) 42.86 (25.21) 0.27 40 35.00 (31.30) 55.00 (29.96) 4.42***
Future-oriented MW% 33 34.55 (21.95) 25.45 (23.06) 2.27* 30 24.00 (23.13) 27.33 (28.03) −0.68

MRT performance
Mean RRT variance 42 8.01 (0.67) 8.19 (0.66) −4.30*** 40 8.06 (0.60) 8.20 (0.62) −3.08**
On-task RRT variance 28 8.23 (1.44) 9.22 (1.22) −3.54** 25 8.21 (1.01) 8.98 (1.67) −1.77
Off-task RRT variance 42 8.03 (0.86) 7.98 (0.99) 0.31 39 7.94 (0.79) 8.38 (0.83) −3.81***
TRIs RRT variance 19 8.08 (1.17) 7.95 (3.41) 0.16 19 7.94 (0.90) 8.70 (2.41) −1.19
EDs RRT variance 40 7.92 (0.95) 9.41 (1.09) −7.37*** 36 8.15 (1.12) 8.95 (1.76) −2.48*
MW RRT variance 42 7.98 (0.95) 9.38 (1.05) −8.36*** 37 8.30 (0.97) 9.32 (1.15) −5.26***

Mood measures
Positive affect 42 23.86 (6.62) 20.86 (9.12) 2.73** 40 22.55 (5.75) 18.80 (8.06) 3.07**
Negative affect 42 15.55 (6.41) 13.64 (5.41) 2.98** 40 17.30 (6.63) 16.35 (7.14) 1.17

Note: On-task: on-task thoughts; Off-task: off-task thoughts, which combined task-related interferences, external distractions, and mind wandering; TRIs: task-related
interferences; EDs: external distractions; MW: mind wandering. Standard deviations from the mean are presented in brackets. Paired-sample t-tests were performed to
examine between-group differences.
* p < 0.05.
** p < 0.01.
*** p < 0.001.

revealed a significant main effect of time, F (1, 80) = 12.48, η2p = 0.135, p < 0.001, but no main effect of condition or interaction
(both ps > 0.29). Similarly, for the proportion of off-task reports, the mixed ANOVA showed a significant main effect of time, F
(1, 80) = 8.96, η2p = 0.101, p = 0.004, but no main effect of condition or interaction (both ps > 0.29). These results suggest that
both groups experienced an increase in off-task thoughts after intervention.
To further examine if meditation affected the composition of off-task thoughts, we performed the same analyses on the
proportions of TRIs, EDs, and mind wandering. For the proportion of TRIs, the mixed ANOVA indicated no main effect of time,
condition, or a time by condition interaction (all ps > 0.34). For the proportion of EDs, we observed no main effect of time or
condition (both ps > 0.46), but we found a significant time by condition interaction, F (1, 80) = 6.09, η2p = 0.071, p = 0.016.
Similarly, for the proportion of mind wandering, the analysis revealed no main effect of condition, F (1, 80) = 0.07, p = 0.79, but a
significant main effect of time, F (1, 80) = 6.97, η2p = 0.080, p = 0.01, and a significant time by condition interaction, F (1, 80)
= 9.28, η2p = 0.104, p = 0.003.
To better understand the significant time by condition interactions, we conducted paired-sample t-tests on the proportions of EDs
and mind wandering for each intervention group. For the proportion of EDs, it stayed constant for the meditation group, t (41)
= −1.46, p = 0.153, but decreased significantly after intervention for the control group, t (39) = 2.04, p = 0.048. For the
proportion of mind wandering, it again stayed constant for the meditation group, t (41) = 0.27, p > 0.79, but increased significantly
after intervention for the control group, t (39) = −4.42, p < 0.001. Therefore, our first hypothesis was confirmed: mindfulness
meditation prevented the occurrence of mind wandering from increasing over time.

3.2. Did mindfulness meditation ameliorate performance disruption during episodes of mind wandering?

Measures of MRT performance are presented in Table 1. We first calculated mean RRT variance, which represents overall task
performance on the MRT. A mixed ANOVA found a significant main effect of time, F (1, 80) = 27.07, η2p = 0.253, p < 0.001, but no
main effect of condition or interaction (both ps > 0.46), suggesting that both groups performed poorer on the MRT after
intervention.
We then examined RRT variance associated with on-task thoughts, which is the response variability participants exhibited prior to
a thought probe in which they reported on-task thought(s). A mixed ANOVA found a significant main effect of condition, F (1, 15)
= 5.41, η2p = 0.265, p = 0.034, but no main effect of time or interaction (both ps > 0.61). For RRT variance associated with off-task
thoughts, the same mixed ANOVA revealed a significant main effect of time, F (1, 79) = 5.17, η2p = 0.061, p = 0.026, and a
significant time by condition interaction, F (1, 79) = 7.50, η2p = 0.087, p = 0.008, but no main effect of condition, F (1, 79) = 0.79,
p = 0.38. We also performed the same analysis on RRT variance associated with TRIs, EDs, and mind wandering. For all three
categories, the mixed ANOVA indicated no main effect of time, condition, or interaction (all ps > 0.11).
To further examine the significant time by condition interaction on off-task RRT variance, we conducted a paired-sample t-test
within each intervention group. Off-task RRT variance stayed constant for the meditation group, t (41) = 0.31, p > 0.76, but

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increased significantly after intervention for the control group, t (38) = −3.81, p < 0.001, indicating deteriorated performance
during episodes of off-task thoughts. Therefore, our second hypothesis was partially confirmed: mindfulness meditation prevented
performance deterioration during episodes of off-task thoughts but not during episodes of mind wandering.

3.3. To what extent did mindfulness meditation influence motivational states?

One additional purpose of this study was to explore the possibility that mindfulness might attenuate mind wandering through
altering motivation. To examine the extent to which meditation influenced motivation, a mixed ANOVA was performed on each of
the three motivation measures. We observed no significant main effect of condition, and no time by condition interaction for all three
(all ps > 0.08), suggesting no significant impact of meditation on motivation.

3.4. Exploring other explanations for the protective effects of mindfulness meditation

Given the absence of influence of meditation on motivational states, we decided to further explore if other factors might have
contributed to the protective effects of mindfulness on mind wandering. In particular, we examined the following three possibilities:
(1) if the observed shift from EDs to mind wandering (as in the control condition) was detrimental to task performance, (2) if changes
in mood states were associated with changes in the proportions of thought reports and task performance, and (3) if meditation
cultivated a shift to present-moment awareness during episodes of mind wandering.
To answer the first question, we conducted a mixed ANOVA, in which response variance was tested as a function of thought
category (on-task vs. TRIs vs. EDs vs. mind wandering) and condition (meditation vs. control), when combining pre-test and post-test.
We observed a trending main effect of condition, F (1, 20) = 4.01, η2p = 0.167, p = 0.059, but no main effect of thought category or
interaction (both ps > 0.14). We also performed a linear mixed model in which thought category was entered as a fixed factor,
subject was entered as a random factor, and response variance was entered as a dependent factor. We observed no significant effect of
thought category (p = 0.46). These results indicate there was no significant difference between EDs and other thought categories in
their associated response variance.
To answer the second question, we conducted a mixed ANOVA, in which time (pre-test vs. post-test) was entered as the within-
subject factor and condition (meditation vs. control) was entered as the between-subject factor. Measures of mood states are
presented in Table 1. For positive affect, we observed a significant main effect of time, F (1, 80) = 16.87, η2p = 0.174, p < 0.001, but
no main effect of condition or interaction (both ps > 0.28). For negative affect, we found a significant main effect of time, F (1, 80)
= 7.71, η2p = 0.088, p = 0.007, but no main effect of condition or interaction (both ps > 0.10). These results suggest that
intervention had a similar impact on positive and negative affect for both groups. Furthermore, correlational analyses revealed that
changes in mood states were not significantly associated with changes in the proportions of different thought reports (e.g., on-task,
off-task, TRIs, EDs, and mind wandering), overall task performance, or off-task RRT variance (all ps > 0.10).
To answer the third question, we first recoded thought probes on temporal orientation (i.e., whether the thought report was past-
oriented, present-oriented, or future-oriented). Inter-rater reliability (Cohen’s kappa) was 0.86 and significant discrepancies were
resolved through discussion. As there were only eight participants who reported past- or present-oriented mind wandering in both
pre- and post-tests, we calculated the proportion of future-oriented mind wandering instead (as presented in Table 1). We then
conducted the same 2 (Time: pre-test vs. post-test) × 2 (Condition: meditation vs. control) mixed ANOVA and observed no main
effect of time or condition (both ps > 0.36), but a trending time by condition interaction, F (1, 61) = 3.92, η2p = 0.060, p = 0.052.
Follow-up paired-sample t-tests revealed that while the proportion of future-oriented mind wandering remained constant for the
control group, t (32) = −0.68, p = 0.502, it decreased significantly for the mindfulness group, t (32) = 2.27, p = 0.03. These results
suggest that meditation promoted a shift away from future-oriented mind wandering.

4. Discussion

The aim of this study was to examine whether a brief session of mindfulness meditation would have protective effects on mind
wandering for highly anxious individuals, as measured in a sustained-attention task. Results suggest that, although both groups
experienced an increase in off-task thoughts after intervention, ten minutes of mindfulness meditation did prevent an increase in
mind wandering. Similarly, mindfulness meditation prevented performance deterioration when participants experienced off-task
thoughts but not when they experienced mind wandering. However, mindfulness meditation did not demonstrate any additional
benefit on motivational or mood states, as compared to the control task.
Most importantly, out results confirmed that mindfulness, as an intervention for mind wandering, was largely preventative for
anxious individuals. Mindfulness training only prevented mind wandering from increasing and stopped performance from
deteriorating during episodes of off-task thoughts, while such protective effects were not observed in the control condition. Our
results are contradictory to findings from prior work (Morrison et al., 2014; Mrazek et al., 2013), which demonstrated that
mindfulness training, regardless of its intensity, can significantly reduce mind wandering and improve task performance in the
general population. However, our results are consistent with findings from some other studies (Banks et al., 2015; Jha et al., 2010,
2015), which showed that mindfulness training can only prevent the detrimental impact of mind wandering for individuals
experiencing high negative affect. Therefore, the present study provides further evidence for the hypothesis that mindfulness training,
as an intervention for mind wandering, is less effective for individuals with high levels of negative affect. For an unselected sample of
university students, eight minutes of meditation was able to deliver significant improvements on the SART (Mrazek et al., 2012). On

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the contrary, for individuals experiencing high levels of stress, mindfulness training that was of a longer duration (e.g., eight weeks as
in Jha et al., 2015) and a higher intensity (e.g., involving home practice as in Banks et al., 2015), only demonstrated protective effects
on mind wandering. Hence, we believe that the small effect size of intervention in this study cannot be solely attributed to its short
duration but more so to the characteristics of its recipients.
The most surprising yet interesting finding is that mindfulness meditation had a significant impact on the specific composition of
conscious experiences reported by participants. Both groups experienced an increase in off-task thoughts from pre-test to post-test.
However, when we looked further at subcategories of off-task thoughts (e.g., task-related interferences, external distractions, and
mind wandering), we observed a significant time by condition interaction on the proportions of both mind wandering and external
distractions. In particular, the meditation group reported fewer mind wandering episodes but more external distractions than the
control group at post-test, while no such differences existed at pre-test. By definition, external distractions are only different from
mind wandering thoughts insofar as they are stimulus-dependent (i.e., they are related to stimuli or physical sensations that are
present in the immediate, external environment). Hence, meditation seemed to cultivate a focus of attention towards external stimuli
and away from internal information. Given that participants recruited in this study endorsed clinical levels of trait anxiety, it is
possible that a significant number of participants were engaging in future-oriented, repetitive thinking such as worries, which would
cause more anxiety and interference with performance. In fact, when we recoded thought reports on their temporal orientation,
results supported such a possibility: while the majority of mind-wandering episodes were rated as future-oriented, most external
distractions were rated as present-oriented. Moreover, the mindfulness group reported a significant decrease in their future-oriented
mind wandering, while the control group did not. Therefore, a shift of attentional focus from internal to external might help
individuals disengage their attention from future-oriented worries and focus more on the “here and now”.
In addition, the demonstrated shift in attentional focus from internal to external stimuli might have important implications for
treating repetitive thinking in anxious populations. In fact, being internally oriented is a defining feature of repetitive thoughts
(Watkins, 2008). If a ten-minute meditation could promote a focus of attention away from internal, abstract information, and towards
stimuli that are in the “here and now” among individuals with trait anxiety at a clinical level, then this might explain why
mindfulness-based interventions are effective in treating rumination (Campbell, Labelle, Bacon, Faris, & Carlson, 2012) and worry
(Robins, Keng, Ekblad, & Brantley, 2012). Our results seemed to suggest that the key factor in treating repetitive thinking might be a
heightened awareness of the present moment. Such a finding interestingly echoes the conclusion made in an previous study: that it is
not mind wandering, per se, that is responsible for psychological distress, but instead a lack of present-moment awareness
(Stawarczyk, Majerus, Van der Linden, & D'Argembeau, 2012).
In addition to these interesting findings, we also attempted to identify processes that might have mediated the observed protective
effects of mindfulness on mind wandering. We first explored if motivation might be a potential pathway through which mindfulness
attenuates mind wandering. The ten-minute mindfulness meditation did not have any significant impact on either performance
motivation or motivation to approach/avoid reported thoughts, thus disconfirming our hypothesis. We then examined if the observed
shift from external distractions to mind wandering was related to performance degradations noted in the control group. Our results
did not support this hypothesis, given there was no significant difference in task performance between external distractions, task-
related interferences, and mind wandering. Such findings are consistent with those from prior work (Stawarczyk, Majerus, Maj, Van
der Linden, & D'Argembeau, 2011; Stawarczyk, Majerus, Maquet et al., 2011). Thirdly, we looked at if the benefits of mindfulness
meditation were a result of changes to mood states. Results showed no difference between meditation and the control task in their
influence on positive or negative affect. Furthermore, changes in mood states were not associated with measures of thought reports or
task performance. Lastly and most interestingly, we tested if mindfulness promoted present-moment awareness during episodes of
mind wandering. Our results suggest that meditation significantly reduced the proportion of future-oriented mind wandering, while
the control task did not. Although our analysis was constrained by the relatively small sample size and the fact that we were unable to
directly examine the proportion of present-oriented mind wandering, we believe this might be an important research direction to
pursue in future.
Despite these interesting findings, there are some limitations to the current study. The first limitation is the lack of control for
expectancy effects in our control condition. Although this specific control task has been used in previous work on mindfulness
(Johnson et al., 2013; Kramer et al., 2013), there is a possibility that participants in the control condition had lower expectations for
improvement, which then led to differential outcomes (for a review see Boot, Simons, Stothart, & Stutts, 2013). We are confident this
was not the case, given participants in both conditions reported similar levels of performance motivation before and after the
intervention. However, we do recommend future studies to adopt control tasks that produce similar expectancy to mindfulness, such
as the progressive muscle relaxation task (Feldman, Greeson, & Senville, 2010). The second limitation is that, due to time constraints,
we only included five thought probes in each block of the MRT. The majority of participants did not report at least one instance of
each of the four thought categories, which limited the statistical power for our analyses on some of the behavioural measures (e.g.,
on-task RRT variance). Thus, we recommend that future studies include more thought probes. A third limitation is the lack of
generalizability of our results to non-anxious individuals, which calls for replication using general populations. Finally, it is important
to note that we adopted the experimenter-classification method in determining episodes of mind wandering (i.e., having participants
report their thoughts verbatim and then having independent judges rate thought reports) instead of using self-classification (i.e.,
having participants choose if they were mind wandering or not). We opted for experimenter-classification because it has been
demonstrated to produce comparable results to self-classification (Smallwood, O'Connor, Sudberry, Haskell, & Ballantyne, 2004;
Smallwood et al., 2004) without inflating estimates of mind wandering (Smallwood & Schooler, 2006).
In summary, the present study is, to the authors’ best knowledge, the first to examine the effects of mindfulness training on mind
wandering in anxious individuals. Despite the increase in off-task thoughts in both conditions, a ten-minute breathing meditation

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prevented mind wandering from increasing over the course of a sustained-attention task and ameliorated performance disruptions
associated with off-task thoughts. Therefore, the present study provides support to the hypothesis that mindfulness training only has
protective effects on mind wandering for individuals experiencing high negative affect (Banks et al., 2015). In addition, mindfulness
training seemed to switch the focus of attention from internal information to external stimuli in the “here and now”, which likely has
very important implications for methods of remediation used to treat worrying in anxious populations.
Compliance with Ethical Standards: This study involved human participations. This study received ethical clearance from the
Office of Research Ethics at the University of Waterloo (#19446). Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants
included in the study. All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical
standards of the institutional research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable
ethical standards. The manuscript does not contain clinical studies or patient data. The authors declare that they have no conflict of
interest.

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by Social Sciences and Humanity Research Council of Canada (SSHRC Insight Grant, The persistence of
unwanted thoughts). We extend our warm gratitude to Casey Oliver and Elizabeth Kalles for their assistance with data collection and
coding.

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