Beyond the Paper: A Conversation with Dr. Andy Kim

Interviewed by Dr. Paige N. McKeon, July 31, 2025

Mindfulness meditation can improve cognition. But does mindfulness meditation influence cognition differently in young, middle-aged, and older adults? In a preregistered study, Kim et al. assessed a measure of cognition (attention control) in 18- to 80-year-old adults following about a month of mindfulness meditation guided by a mobile app. Interestingly, mindfulness improved attention control in all participants as measured by eye movement tasks that assess how quickly people orient their attention. A control group that listened to an audio book did not have this cognitive improvement. Notably, self-reported measures of cognitive ability, including attention and distractibility, suggested that participants were not aware of the cognitive improvement from meditation. These findings suggest that mindfulness meditation apps may improve aspects of attention control, independent of age.

“I specifically chose to pursue a Registered Report for this project because I was entering a new research domain, using mindfulness meditation as an intervention, and I wanted to ensure the methodological rigor and appropriateness of my experiment design.”

Dr. Andy Kim

What drew you to neuroscience and your current position?

I have been fascinated by the brain since high school, particularly its complexity, the allure of the unknown, and its profound influence on our entire being. While I knew early on that I wanted to dedicate my career to exploring the brain, discovering my precise research interests and methodologies was a gradual and exploratory journey. During my undergraduate studies at the University of California San Diego, I worked in a clinical psychology lab examining teaching strategies for children with autism. In my master’s program, I transitioned to animal research investigating the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying visual processes. Ultimately, during my doctoral training at Texas A&M University, I realized my true passion lay in studying human cognition, particularly in the context of understanding the networks and connections regulating emotion regulation. My current postdoctoral position represents a natural extension of these interests. I sought and connected with a mentor who is a leader in this field, allowing me to deepen my exploration of emotional and cognitive processes while expanding my research into the fields of aging and Alzheimer’s disease.

What are your career goals? Do you have advice for anyone pursuing a similar trajectory?

After completing my postdoctoral training, my immediate career goal is to lead an independent research laboratory in an academic position. I specifically chose this career path because alongside my passion for research and the pursuit of knowledge, I deeply value the mentorship opportunities offered by academia. Through my pre- and postdoctoral training, I have been blessed to have exceptional mentors who have guided me as a scholar and as a person. Similarly, mentoring undergraduate students has been a rewarding experience for me and I aim to make as positive an impact on others as I have received throughout my own trajectory.

My primary advice for anyone pursuing this competitive career path is to proactively prepare for the next stage of your career before you reach it. For example, as a PhD student, I sought opportunities to develop skills and independence akin to those of a postdoctoral researcher and was able to lead research projects in a then growing lab. Now, as a postdoc, I actively manage multiple projects similar to the responsibilities of an investigator and have been trained with the skills and received the career development in a F32 postdoctoral fellowship by the National Institute on Aging. This forward-looking approach helped me to have the confidence and skills to successfully transition into each subsequent career stage and achieve benchmarks required.

Why did you decide to preregister this study? How would you describe the process to someone who hasn’t done it before?

This was my second experience with preregistration through a Registered Report. The first time I undertook this process was during my predoctoral training when Registered Reports were being introduced to multiple research fields led by co-founder Dr. Christopher Chambers.

The Registered Report model involves a two-stage peer-review process. First you identify a journal that supports Registered Reports and submit an initial manuscript consisting of just an introduction and detailed methods section. At this initial stage, you outline your research rationale, hypotheses, analytic plans, and experimental procedures, including a thorough power analysis.

Unlike standard preregistration, a Registered Report requires this proposal to undergo formal peer review and journal approval. Once approved, the introduction and methods sections become fixed, apart from verb tense edits, thereby preventing any deviation from the proposed protocol. Crucially, after peer reviewers and editors approve the plan, I received “in-principle acceptance” meaning the journal guarantees publication of the study regardless of whether the results support, reject, or do not find sufficient evidence to reject the hypotheses.

Upon completing your study, you submit the results and discussion sections which undergo a second round of peer review. This stage ensures that the research was conducted exactly as proposed and that the findings are interpreted appropriately. This rigorous and transparent approach not only enhances the credibility of the research but also contributes to addressing reproducibility challenges in science.

Did preregistration increase your confidence in the methodological plan and results? Would you recommend it to other scientists?

I specifically chose to pursue a Registered Report for this project because I was entering a new research domain, using mindfulness meditation as an intervention, and I wanted to ensure the methodological rigor and appropriateness of my experiment design. I anticipated that expert peer reviewers would help identify critical considerations or potential oversights. Indeed, during the first stage of peer review, an anonymous reviewer insightfully suggested including a positive control condition rather than the negative control I initially proposed. As a result, the audiobook intervention was added, significantly enhancing the interpretability of the findings.

My experience with Registered Reports has consistently increased my confidence in both the methodological design and the results. I particularly recommend Registered Reports to pre- and postdoctoral scholars. The process holds your research to the highest standards by encouraging meticulous planning and careful consideration of methodological details upfront. I believe this practice specifically aids in grant writing. Ultimately, Registered Reporting is an excellent tool for conducting robust and reproducible research through the highest standards and transparency.

Did you face any challenges while working on this project that you’d like to share?

There were two main aspects of this project whose complexity I initially underestimated: the longitudinal nature of the study and the compliance required from participants at home. Given that this research involved three separate visits, we anticipated and accounted for potential participant dropouts ahead of time and had to consider this in randomized group assignments. However, participant attrition extended our data collection timeline more than anticipated and we had to communicate with the journal editors about these delays near the end of the given study timeline. Additionally, maintaining daily compliance with home-based intervention activities posed significant logistical challenges. Ensuring participants adhered to daily tasks required consistent follow-up through daily emails and sometimes phone calls, which were time-consuming. We had to implement automated systems early in the process to streamline the communication and tracking processes. I wouldn’t have been able to complete this project without two undergraduate mentees, Keran Chen and Ying Tian, who are co-authors on this paper. Finally, because our participants were older adults, we also had to remain flexible and responsive to health-related changes that occurred during the study period. The most challenging aspects of this study were retaining participants and administering high at-home compliance.

Were you surprised at any of your results?

One surprising finding involved distractibility. We initially hypothesized that mindfulness practice would reduce distractibility. However, our results indicated the opposite effect. Within the context of the visual search paradigm, it appears that mindfulness training, which emphasizes heightened awareness of the present moment, may have inadvertently increased participants’ attentional prioritization toward salient distractors. This unexpected outcome underscores the complexity of mindfulness interventions and indicates the ability for guided mindfulness to modify brain circuitry and connections.

What upcoming research projects should we keep an eye out for?

In this study, we specifically hypothesized that mindfulness meditation would differentially influence attentional mechanisms in young, middle-aged, and older adults based on age-related changes in the neuromodulatory locus coeruleus-noradrenaline system. Moving forward, I plan to further develop my research program by examining how this system changes throughout aging and exploring its role in the progression of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease. My research will particularly emphasize identifying critical functional changes during midlife that could predict whether individuals follow a trajectory toward healthy aging or develop significant neuropathology. Ultimately, the goal of my work is to detect individuals at risk during these critical periods and implement early intervention strategies before neurodegenerative changes become irreversible. I will be applying for assistant professor positions starting this cycle where I aim to establish an independent lab dedicated to pursuing this important line of research.

• Mental health app: Mental Health App for Meditation & Sleep - Headspace
• Dr. Mara Mather’s Emotion and Cognition Lab
• Dr. Andy Kim’s website

Learn more about paper type options, including registered reports at eNeuro:
https://www.eneuro.org/content/general-information#types

Read the full article:

The Effects of Mindfulness Meditation on Mechanisms of Attentional Control in Young and Older Adults: A Preregistered Eye Tracking Study
Andy Jeesu Kim, Keran Chen, Ying Tian, and Mara Mather