A single session of meditation reduces of physiological indices of anger in both experienced and novice meditators.
Author: Fennell AB1, Benau EM1, Atchley RA2.
Affiliation:
1Department of Psychology, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66045, United States. 2Department of Psychology, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66045, United States. Electronic address: ratchley@ku.edu.
Conference/Journal: Conscious Cogn.
Date published: 2015 Dec 31
Other:
Volume ID: 40 , Pages: 54-66 , Special Notes: doi: 10.1016/j.concog.2015.12.010 , Word Count: 166
Abstract
The goal of the present study was to explore how anger reduction via a single session of meditation might be measured using psychophysiological methodologies. To achieve this, 15 novice meditators (Experiment 1) and 12 practiced meditators (Experiment 2) completed autobiographical anger inductions prior to, and following, meditation training while respiration rate, heart rate, and blood pressure were measured. Participants also reported subjective anger via a visual analog scale. At both stages, the experienced meditators' physiological reaction to the anger induction reflected that of relaxation: slowed breathing and heart rate and decreased blood pressure. Naïve meditators exhibited physiological reactions that were consistent with anger during the pre-meditation stage, while after meditation training and a second anger induction they elicited physiological evidence of relaxation. The current results examining meditation training show that the naïve group's physiological measures mimicked those of the experienced group following a single session of meditation training.
Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier Inc.
KEYWORDS:
Blood pressure; Heart-rate variability; Meditation; Mood induction; Open-monitoring; Polyvagal theory; Respiration rate
PMID: 26748026
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