More about the Default Mode Network

The Default Mode Network, or DMN, is not a single area of the brain, but a network of interconnected regions. These include parts of the medial prefrontal cortex and posterior cingulate cortex.¹

What this network is occupied with is fascinating. Among other things, the DMN is involved when we think about ourselves, retrieve memories, imagine possible futures, or try to understand other people’s thoughts and perspectives.

The Story We Tell about Ourselves

Its connection with self-perception is especially interesting. Part of our thinking consists of an ongoing story about who we are, what has happened to us, and what might happen in the future.

This is fundamentally useful. Without this ability, we could hardly learn from our past or plan our future. But the same processes may also be involved in rumination: one thought leads to the next, past situations are played through again and again, or possible future problems are anticipated.

Increased or altered activity and connectivity within the DMN is therefore also studied in relation to mental health conditions such as depression. This does not, however, mean that an active DMN is pathological or that rumination simply arises from ‘too much DMN’.

Three Networks Working Together

Something interesting happens during meditation: your thoughts wander, at some point you notice, and then you redirect your attention.

The Default Mode Network is not the only network involved. In simplified terms, mind-wandering is associated with activity in the DMN. A so-called Salience Network helps detect relevant changes, such as the moment you notice that your mind has wandered. Cognitive control networks then help you consciously redirect your attention.²

Meditation can therefore also be seen as a repeated interplay between different brain networks: wander, notice, return.

Less DMN Is Not Automatically Better

Differences have been found in both the activity and connectivity of the Default Mode Network in experienced meditators. Some studies, for example, observe less activity in key areas of the DMN during certain meditations.¹

But this does not mean that meditation switches off this network—and certainly not that doing so would be desirable.

The DMN performs important functions. A more interesting question may be whether meditation changes how flexibly we can switch between self-referential thinking and attention to present experience.³

Part of the effect may therefore lie not in thinking less about ourselves, but in noticing earlier when we become lost in our own thoughts.