Individual differences in meditation interventions: A meta-analytic study

Objectives

Meditation interventions typically show small to moderate effects on health and well‐being, but we know little about how these effects vary across individuals. This meta‐analytic study investigates the relationship between baseline participant characteristics and the outcomes of meditation.

Methods

A systematic search yielded 51 eligible studies with 7782 participants. A combination of subgroup analyses and meta‐regression based on the random‐effects model were used.

Results

We found that a higher baseline level of psychopathology or depression was associated with deterioration in mental health after a meditation intervention. On the other hand, participants with higher scores on interpersonal variables, motivation, medical conditions, and mindfulness showed higher levels of positive meditation outcomes. Higher well‐being and stress were simultaneously associated with moderate increases in negative and positive meditation outcomes. Participant demographics, psychological traits, self‐concept, and length of meditation practice did not significantly influence the response to meditation.

Conclusions

Overall, we found that meditation interventions affect participants differently, and identified some of the individual characteristics that should be considered when using meditation interventions.

Mantras and Meditation: A Literature Review

It is often claimed by teachers of meditation that the “mantra-person fit” is of central importance to the effects of practice. A review of the literature exposed no compelling evidence to support such a claim. On the contrary, it appears that any “mental device,” onto which the attention can be focussed, is equally effective in terms of measurable outcome.

Personality correlates of meditation practice frequency and dropout in an outpatient population

A prospective study was conducted to determine personality trait correlates of regularity of meditation practice and dropout over a 2-year follow-up period in outpatients referred for relaxation therapy. Patients were supervised on a monthly basis and classified as regular vs. irregular practitioners or dropouts at 3, 6, 12, and 24 months after they began meditating on a daily basis. Short-term (3-month) compliance was related to low levels of pretest sensitization, introversion, suggestibility, and neuroticism. Long-term (6- to 24-month) compliance was related only to repression and extraversion. By the end of 2 years, roughly half (54%) of the patients had terminated meditation altogether.

Biochemical indices associated with meditation practice: a literature review

Research findings on biochemical responsivity to meditation are reviewed. Although there are some contradictory and inconclusive outcomes, there is nevertheless sufficient evidence of interest to warrant further investigation of this area. However, in the meantime, there is no compelling basis to conclude that meditation practice is associated with special state or trait effects at the biochemical level.

Response to meditation in terms of physiological, behavioural and self-report measures: a brief summary

This is a summary of findings from a series of investigations of predisposition to and reported benefit from the practice of meditation. It focuses, in particular, on psychometric indices as predictors of psychophysiological and behavioural response to meditation. A psychological “unhealthy” profile is related to a poor response to meditation.

Meditation practice as related to occupational stress, health and productivity

This article reviews three studies giving evidence on the effects of meditation practice on employees' health in the work setting. Although there may be a beneficial role for meditation, unfortunately, these findings await further replication so it would be premature to conclude that meditation practice reduces occupational stress.

Physiological responses during meditation and rest

Forty nonmeditators and 12 experienced transcendental meditators were randomly assigned to four experimental cells devised to control for order and expectation effects. All 52 (female) subjects were continuously monitored on seven physiological measures during both meditation and rest. Each subject was her own control in an abab experimental paradigm comparing meditation to rest. Analyses of variance on change scores calculated from both initial and running (intertrial) baselines revealed small but significant conditions effects for all variables except diastolic BP. The same subjects (both experienced meditators and those meditating for the first time) showed lower psychophysiological arousal during the meditation than during the rest condition for systolic BP, HR, SCL, digital BV, digital ST, and frontalis EMG. The experienced meditators showed only marginally more conditions effects than the novices practicing "noncultic" meditation. For the nonmeditators, deliberately fostering positive expectations of meditations was associated with lower physiological arousal in terms of diastolic BP, HR, and SCL. These findings suggest that both cultic and noncultic meditation are associated with lower physiological activation than eyes-closed rest. The meditators, however, tended to become more relaxed over meditation trials, whereas the nonmeditators showed the opposite trend.

Some cognitive aspects of meditation practice

This article reviews the role of some cognitive factors in practice of meditation. It is suggested that more attention should be given to such covert aspects of meditation as expectations, attitudes, and imagery, etc. Non-observable subjective experiences during meditation have not been adequately researched.