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Watch a clock. Does your mind move faster than the second hand?
Long-term meditators have larger amounts of gyrification, or "folding" of the cortex, than people who do not meditate, according to a recent UCLA study. The gyrification may allow the brain to process information faster.
The theory is that the more folding occurs, the better the brain is at processing information, making decisions, forming memories and so forth.
Results of the study, conducted by Eileen Luders, an assistant professor at the UCLA Laboratory of Neuro Imaging, and colleagues, were published in the online edition of the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience (Read the abstract here).
A direct correlation was also found between the amount of gyrification and the number of years a person meditates—possibly providing further proof of the brain's ability to adapt.
For more on Luders' studies at UCLA, read "Your brain doesn't look a day over 40, dear." To read some of Mindful.org's coverage of other studies involving meditation and the brain, click here.
03/19/12