Participants

In the study of Hutcherson et al. [7], there was a significant three-way interaction of picture*group*time, with F = 2.42 in the explicit task. Based on their findings, the necessary sample size to find the same three-way interaction in our study with a power of 0.8 and an alpha value of 0.05 was estimated using BUCSS package for R and resulted in a required N = 76 [22]. This three-way interaction was also found for the implicit task in the study of Hutcherson et al. [7], with F = 2.31. Accordingly, a necessary sample size of 82 was estimated. Based on this estimation, 82 participants were recruited. 13 participants with 50% or more missing trials or false responses in the implicit task were excluded from the analysis. Overall, the sample population (N = 69) consisted of 38 female students (age: M = 21.87, SD = 2.37) and 31 male students (age: M = 22.23, SD = 1.98) attending the course “applied movement sciences” (a combination of sports science, psychology, and medicine). The age of the participants did not differ between groups, (age Imagery: M = 22.00, SD = 2.32, age LKM: M = 22.06, SD = 2.09, t(67) =  − 0.11, p = 0.910). The students were recruited via an online newsletter from the institute. Average meditation practice for the whole sample was 33.75 min per month (SD = 109.69) and 39.13% indicated to meditate on a regular basis, while 10.15% have never meditated and 50.72% only tried it once. Groups did not differ regarding monthly meditation practice, as demonstrated by a Wilcoxon-Mann–Whitney test: Z = 0.98, p = 0.326. Participants were assigned to the groups by block randomization and according to their time of participation. Participants were unaware of their group assignment as they were instructed to listen to a focusing exercise.

All participants received an information sheet in advance and signed the written consent declaration. After study completion, participants were informed about the background of the affective priming paradigm and the different experimental conditions. The experiment was conducted according to the ethical guidelines of the Helsinki Declaration and approved by the ethics board of the University of Regensburg (19-1619-101).