Research

Projects

Our two main projects at the moment are (i) the development an integrative framework in which the yoga sutras (Patanjali) are used to generate testable predictions within a cognitive operationalization; and (ii) collecting empirical data during the yoga retreats organized by Yogalife that can shed a mechanistic light on changes in attentional, interoceptive, and emotional capacity.

Project 1 — A cognitive operationalization of the Yoga Sutras. This project develops an integrative theoretical framework that treats Patañjali's Yoga Sutras not as a devotional text but as a structured phenomenological model of attention and metacognition, and asks what testable predictions follow when its constructs are mapped onto contemporary cognitive science. The ashtanga (8 limbs) progression — yama (ethical restraints), niyama (observances), āsana (posture), prāṇāyāma (breath regulation), pratyāhāra (sensory withdrawal), dhāraṇā (concentration), dhyāna (sustained meditative attention), and samādhi (absorptive union) — is structured as a graded reorganization of attention and self-referential processing that can be operationalizable in terms of existing constructs (e.g., reductions in attentional lapses and mind-wandering frequency, shifts in the balance between external and internal attention, and changes in interoceptive precision). The aim is not to validate the sutras but to use them as a generative source of hypotheses that current cognitive frameworks underdetermine, particularly around long-timescale attentional stability and phenomenology.

Project 2 — Data collection during Yogalife retreats. In parallel, we are running a longitudinal field study at residential yoga retreats organized by Yogalife, using the retreat context as a naturalistic intervention to probe changes in attentional, interoceptive, and emotional capacity. Participants will complete pre-, post-, and delayed-retreat assessments combining behavioral tasks (e.g., sustained-attention, attentional flexibility, and interoceptive flexibility) and experience sampling of affect and mind-wandering. Our aim is to identify the cognitive mechanisms underlying attentional and interoceptive shifts, their timescale, and whether those shifts track the phenomenological transitions described in Project 1.