# Rescuing the ruminating brain: Identifying biomarkers of rumination and mindfulness through concurrent EEG and fMRI studies of schizophrenia and depression

> **NIH VA I01** · VETERANS AFFAIRS MED CTR SAN FRANCISCO · 2022 · —

## Abstract

Is “the idle mind the devil’s playground?” It depends on where the wandering mind goes. If it is busy
reflecting on recent activity, consolidating recent material into long term memories, and envisioning the future,
then these thought patterns may be highly adaptive, allowing us to learn from the past and plan for the future.
But when the mind turns to the dark side and rumination takes over, these thought patterns are maladaptive.
Rumination involves recursive negative thinking focused on causes and consequences rather than solutions. It
cuts across diagnostic boundaries: it is both a cause and consequence of major depressive disorder (MDD) and
is related to hallucinations and delusions in schizophrenia (SZ). It affects cognitive and emotional responses, yet
it can be treated with mindfulness-based therapies.
 Mindfulness-meditation is a type of behavioral therapy that focuses on cultivating present focused attention,
is a stress-reduction intervention that targets rumination, and improves many medical and psychiatric
conditions: Trait mindfulness is associated with less distress from auditory hallucinations and fewer residual
depressive symptoms. It is the practice of attending to present moment experiences and allowing emotions and
thoughts to come and go without judgment, thereby avoiding a downward spiral into rumination. Compared to
simple mind wandering, a brief mindfulness induction recruits an attention network including parietal and
 .
prefrontal structures while mind wandering only recruits the default mode network (DMN)
 Based on data from the last funding period, we know that activation of the DMN affects both basic sensory
and semantic processing in SZ. We propose to extend this by focusing specifically on rumination and adding
patients with depression. We ask how rumination affects basic sensory, cognitive and emotional responses, and
if mindfulness can rescue these functions, across diagnoses and the wellness spectrum. We will acquire
simultaneous EEG and fMRI data from veterans with depression and schizophrenia and mentally healthy
veterans to assess early sensory responses, context updating, and responses to emotional images.
 Understanding how rumination affects engagement with the environment is the first step towards assessing
its far-reaching cognitive and emotional costs, which cut across traditional diagnostic boundaries.
Understanding how mindfulness restores information processing will increase our understanding of how, and
for whom, it works. We predict rumination inductions will prevent the brain from fully processing a spectrum
of external events, and mindfulness inductions will restore these abilities. We predict trait rumination and
mindfulness will modulate the effects in all groups, with exaggerated effects in those with depression or
schizophrenia. The outcome variables will be EEG-based event related potentials (ERPs) and fMRI, and their
integration. Symptom severity, trait rumination, and trait mindfulness will...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10683060
- **Project number:** 5I01CX000497-09
- **Recipient organization:** VETERANS AFFAIRS MED CTR SAN FRANCISCO
- **Principal Investigator:** Judith M Ford
- **Activity code:** I01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** VA
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** —
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2011-07-01 → 2024-09-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10683060

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10683060, Rescuing the ruminating brain: Identifying biomarkers of rumination and mindfulness through concurrent EEG and fMRI studies of schizophrenia and depression (5I01CX000497-09). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-21 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10683060. Licensed CC0.

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