Behavioural Avoidance Before and After the Practice of Meditation: A Comparative Study
Abstract:
Objective: The study was carried out to compare the behavioural avoidance of people before and after the practice of meditation.
Methodology: The study was undertaken among a randomly selected sample of 50 meditators from Kerala State of India using a questionnaire, which contained the measure of Behavioural Avoidance, and the characteristics of the respondents, namely, sex, age, marital status, and whether experienced any psychological problems during the past six months or not. The data was analysed as scores, proportion reporting and through statistical test.
Results: Statistically significant improvement was observed in mean behavioural avoidance score after the prac tice of meditation, indicating less of behavioural avoidance. The range of behavioural avoidance scores after meditation practice also supports this observation. The benefits of meditation in reducing behavioural avoidance were also experienced by a very high proportion of meditators under the study. Psychological problems faced by the meditators during the past six months has resulted in more of behavioural avoidance by them. The charac teristics of the meditators sex, age and marital status were not found to statistically influence their behavioural avoidance. This implies that the positive effect of meditation on behavioural avoidance is consistent, irrespective of the demographic characteristics of the practitioners, and hence, it may be useful for most of the meditators for reducing behavioural avoidance.
Conclusion: Less behavioural avoidance observed after starting meditation practice could probably enable the meditators to engage more openly with situations they might otherwise avoid. The practice of meditation could reduce hypervigilance and avoidance tendencies by enhancing present-moment awareness and reducing cognitive distortions such as unfavourable thought processes.
