The Saron Lab

About the lab

Our work involves two broad areas of investigation. The first is related to the training of attention and emotion regulation through contemplative practice. We conducted a large-scale collaborative and multi-method longitudinal investigation of the effects of intensive meditation training, known as The Shamatha Project. To begin to elucidate the many levels of personal and physiological change that accompany such training, we analyze qualitative, self-report, behavioral, electrophysiological, and biochemical measures.

We are currently extending our work on meditation to investigate how people are using contemplative practice to cope with current conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic. To learn more about this research, please visit our project page at contemplative-coping-covid-19.ucdavis.edu/.

Our second research area concerns sensory processing, multisensory integration, and interhemispheric communication in children with autism spectrum disorders. In collaboration with colleagues at the CMB and M.I.N.D. Institute, we use sensitive behavioral measures, eye tracking, and dense channel array event-related potentials to investigate possible deficits in these low-level processes, which likely contribute to the complex phenotype of autism.