Effects of a Brief Mindfulness-Based Attentional Intervention on Threat-Related Perceptual Decision-Making

Objectives: Threat-related cues and contexts facilitate perceptual decision-making, yet it is unclear whether this threat-driven tuning of perceptual decision-making is modifiable by top-down attentional control. Since state and dispositional mindfulness are linked to improved attentional control, we examined whether these factors assist the use of prior knowledge to detect threatening stimuli. Methods: Participants were randomly assigned to a brief mindfulness-based intervention (N = 32) or a physics lecture audio recording (N = 31) and then asked to perform a task in which they used threatening and neutral cues to discriminate between threatening and neutral faces. Results: Results showed that threatening cues led to faster and more sensitive perceptual decision-making, specifically for threatening faces. Furthermore, higher levels of dispositional mindfulness were associated with improved ability to use cues to discriminate between threatening and neutral stimuli in the group that underwent a brief mindfulness induction but not in the control group. Conclusions: Our findings highlight how top-down attention-related dispositions and strategies can influence our ability to detect threats in our environment.