ArticleSocial cognitive and affective neuroscience2019
Let it be: mindful acceptance down-regulates pain and negative emotion.
Article in Social cognitive and affective neuroscience, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 46 papers, 5 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
46 citing papers in PubMed, 5 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Cultural background and pandemic context as moderators of the association between expressive suppression and sleep quality in healthy adults: a systematic review and meta‑analysis.BMC psychology · 2026Pooled it
- Mechanism of Action of Mindfulness-Based Interventions for Pain Relief-A Systematic Review.Journal of integrative and complementary medicine · 2024Pooled it
- The Utility of Meditation and Mindfulness-Based Interventions in the Time of COVID-19: A Theoretical Proposition and Systematic Review of the Relevant Prison, Quarantine and Lockdown Literature.Psychological reports · 2023Pooled it
- Comparing reappraisal and acceptance strategies to understand the neural architecture of emotion regulation: a meta-analytic approach.Frontiers in psychology · 2023Pooled it
- Emotion regulation and peripheral psychophysiological correlates in the management of induced pain: A systematic review.PloS one · 2021Pooled it
- Exploring pain sensitivity changes after acceptance and attention bias modification trainings: preliminary evidence on fear of pain and attention bias.Scientific reports · 2026Trial
- Mindfulness Meditation and Placebo Modulate Distinct Multivariate Neural Signatures to Reduce Pain.Biological psychiatry · 2025Trial
- Randomized trial of mindfulness- and reappraisal-based regulation of craving training among daily cigarette smokers.Psychology of addictive behaviors : journal of the Society of Psychologists in Addictive Behaviors · 2023Trial
- Mindful attention promotes control of brain network dynamics for self-regulation and discontinues the past from the present.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2023Trial
- Randomized trial of a single-session digital intervention targeting emotion-related beliefs and emotion regulation.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Advances in Pharmacologic- and Non-pharmacologic Interventions for Cancer Pain: A Narrative Review.Current treatment options in oncology · 2026Review
- A Chain mediation model linking experiential avoidance, cognitive flexibility, negative emotions, and sleep quality in university students.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Common and distinct neurofunctional signatures of dynamic naturalistic emotion regulation strategies.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Mindfulness-Based Interventions for Bereavement: A Systematized Narrative Review.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- An Intervention Based on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Childhood Separation Anxiety: A Case Study.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Brain Connectivity of the Cingulate Cortex in Alcohol Use Disorder: Exploring Its Association With Mindfulness.Addiction biology · 2025Article
- What can speech tell us about pain?Pain reports · 2025Article
- Expectation generation and its effect on subsequent pain and visual perception.PLoS computational biology · 2025Article
- Decoding Mindfulness With Multivariate Predictive Models.Biological psychiatry. Cognitive neuroscience and neuroimaging · 2025Review
- Implementation of Mindfulness-Based Emotion Regulation Strategies: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.Affective science · 2025Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Mindfulness training ameliorates clinical and self-report measures of depression and chronic pain, but its use as an emotion regulation strategy-in individuals who do not meditate-remains understudied. As such, whether it (i) down-regulates early affective brain processes or (ii) depends on cognitive control systems remains unclear. We exposed meditation-naïve participants to two kinds of stimuli: negative vs. neutral images and painful vs. warm temperatures. On alternating blocks, we asked participants to either react naturally or exercise mindful acceptance. Emotion regulation using mindful acceptance was associated with reductions in reported pain and negative affect, reduced amygdala responses to negative images and reduced heat-evoked responses in medial and lateral pain systems. Critically, mindful acceptance significantly reduced activity in a distributed, a priori neurologic signature that is sensitive and specific to experimentally induced pain. In addition, these changes occurred in the absence of detectable increases in prefrontal control systems. The findings support the idea that momentary mindful acceptance regulates emotional intensity by changing initial appraisals of the affective significance of stimuli, which has consequences for clinical treatment of pain and emotion.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.