A Comparative Study on the Emotional Stability of Meditation Practitioners and Non-Practitioners
Abstract:
Objective: To analyse the effect of meditation on emotional stability of the practitioners, when compared to people who do not practice meditation.
Methodology: The study was carried out among 50 breath awareness based meditation practitioners (experimental group) of Satyananda Yoga Research Centre, Kozhikode, Kerala, India and 50 non-meditators from Kozhikode (control group) using a questionnaire containing the measure of emotional stability, which includes five negative emotional parameters and three positive parameters experienced during the past one month. The data was analysed as score, percentage of respondents reporting and through statistical test.
Results: The findings of the study indicate the effect of meditation practice in helping the respondents to experience positive emotions more and reduce the experience of negative emotions, when compared to people who do not practice meditation. This is also established from the comparatively higher and statistically significant total emotional stability score of the meditators, when compared to the score of non-meditators. The scores for three positive emotional parameters and five negative parameters under the study are also found to be comparatively more for meditators than non-meditators, with statistically significant difference in the scores.
Conclusions: People who practice meditation are able to maintain more emotional stability in their life through better experience of positive emotions and less experience of negative emotions, when compared to those who are not practicing meditation.
