Mindfulness and the Quality of Organizational Attention

TLDR

Mindfulness, as defined by Levinthal and Rerup, involves encoding ambiguous outcomes and aligning stimuli with routine repertoires. The study extends Levinthal and Rerup’s conjectures by comparing Western and Eastern mindfulness and exploring how they function as a process of knowing an object. The authors find that encoding is less central, with attention shifting toward altering, differentiating, and introspecting codes, reducing reliance on coding, and that outcomes depend more on the quality than quantity of attention.

Abstract

Mindfulness as depicted by Levinthal and Rerup (2006) involves encoding ambiguous outcomes in ways that influence learning, and encoding stimuli in ways that match context with a repertoire of routines. We add to Levinthal and Rerup’s conjectures by examining Western and Eastern versions of mindfulness and how they function as a process of knowing an object. In our expanded view, encoding becomes less central. What becomes more central are activities such as altering the codes, differentiating the codes, introspecting the coding process itself, and, most of all, reducing the overall dependence on coding and codes. Consequently, we shift from Levinthal and Rerup’s contrast between mindful and less mindful to a contrast between conceptual and less conceptual. When people move away from conceptuality and encoding, outcomes are affected more by the quality than by the quantity of attention.