Our subjective sensory experiences are thought to be heavily shaped by interactions
between expectations and incoming sensory information. However, the neural mechanisms …

The subjective experience of one's environment is constructed by interactions among
sensory, cognitive, and affective processes. For centuries, meditation has been thought to …

Some individuals claim that they are very sensitive to pain, whereas others say that they
tolerate pain well. Yet, it is difficult to determine whether such subjective reports reflect true …

Parallel, largely segregated, closed-loop projections are an important component of cortical–basal
ganglia–cortical connectional architecture. Here, we present the hypothesis that such …

Mindfulness meditation reduces pain in experimental and clinical settings. However, it
remains unknown whether mindfulness meditation engages pain-relieving mechanisms other …

The cognitive modulation of pain is influenced by a number of factors ranging from attention,
beliefs, conditioning, expectations, mood, and the regulation of emotional responses to …

Anxiety is the cognitive state related to the inability to control emotional responses to
perceived threats. Anxiety is inversely related to brain activity associated with the cognitive …

1. Psychophysical experiments were initiated to determine the possible influence of increasing
stimulus size on perceived pain intensity. Six trained human subjects (5 male, 1 female) …

Cerebral cortical activity is heavily influenced by interactions with the basal ganglia. These
interactions occur via cortico-basal ganglia-thalamo-cortical loops. The putamen is one of the …

Mindfulness meditation, a cognitive practice premised on sustaining nonjudgmental
awareness of arising sensory events, reliably attenuates pain. Mindfulness meditation activates …