Effect of qigong on personality

It is well known that personality and health are closely related. For example.the incidence of CHD is associated with type A behaviour pattern (TABP); several psychosomatic diseases are usually associated with neuroticism and so on. So if these types of personality could be modified by practicing qigong, it should be useful to prevent and cure some diseases.

In the first part of our research, the effect of qigong on personality was investigated with the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) and Type A Behaviour Pattern Questionnaire. One hundred and twenty-two subjects who have practised qigong more than two years by a mean age of 65 were used as the experimental group. Ninety subjects aged over 60 who had never practised qigong were used as the control group. The results showed that the N score was significantly lower in the qigong group than that in the control group. The persons of TABP amounted to 39.3% in the qigong group, 51.1% in the control group.

In the second part of our research, all of the subjects were college students aged 21. Fifty subjects had practised qigong more than two years, and 97 subjects had never practised qigong. The results were similar to the first part of our research, i. e. N score of EPQ and percentage of TABP were significantly lower in the qigong group than those in the control group. These results suggest that qigong can relieve neuroticism, and TABP can be changed by practising qigong. As a great number of subjects were investigated in these researches mentioned above, the results should suggest that qigong is beneficial to correct the unhealthy tendency of personality to certain extent. But because of the cross-section study, it was difficult to exclude the factor of self-selection, so the longitudinal study was carried out by us.

In the third part of our research, the data of EPQ and TABP were collected from 158 college students when they started to practise qigong. Two years later, EPQ and TABP were mearsured again. There were 33 subjects who had persisted qigong exercise during the two years, but 83 subjects only for several days and 42 subjects for a few months. The N score of EPQ in the persistent group decreased from 13.4±5.1 to 11.1±4. (p<0.02). No significant change of N score was observed in the third group (83 subjects, N score from 13.2±4.7 to 14.2±5.2). In the persistent group, TH score of TABP decreased significantly and CH score decreased slightly. In the third group, both TH and CH score had no remarkable change between two measures. All of these results suggest that qigong has positive effect on regulation of the unhealthy tendency in personality.