Four weeks of Bhastrika pranayama, a yoga breathing exercise, significantly reduced anxiety and negative affect in thirty healthy young adults. Brain scans showed that the practice modulated activity in emotion-processing regions including the amygdala, anterior cingulate, anterior insula, and prefrontal cortex, and decreased functional connectivity between the anterior insula and lateral prefrontal cortex. Changes in connectivity between the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex and right anterior insula correlated with changes in anxiety. The authors note these analyses were preliminary and exploratory.
This work presents a theoretical and methodological framework for studying the mind by integrating first-person (subjective) and second-person (intersubjective) phenomenological inquiry with experimental methods and EEG data. It argues that combining introspective and mindful awareness practices with objective brain measurements can provide a more comprehensive understanding of consciousness than either approach alone. The paper outlines how such integration can bridge the gap between subjective experience and neuroscientific observation, offering a pathway to study mental phenomena that are otherwise inaccessible through purely third-person methods.