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Meditation may reduce drug-related deaths

Recent findings suggested that group mediation may affect collective stress and, in turn, reduce stress-related indicators of public health, including drug-related mortality and infant mortality rates.

“Meta-analysis of research on individuals practicing Transcendental Meditation has found that increased mental silence during the practice, in comparison with sitting with eyes closed, is associated physiologically with a unique state of restful alertness (higher basal galvanic skin resistance, lower breath rate, lower plasma lactate),” Michael C. Dillbeck, PhD, and Kenneth L. Cavanaugh, PhD, of Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa, wrote. “This state of restful alertness, or reduced physiological stress, is also evident in participants outside the practice period (lower respiration rate, lower heart rate, lower plasma lactate, and fewer spontaneous skin resistance responses).”

To expand on previous studies on consciousness, social well-being, collective stress and stress-related indicators of public health, specifically infant mortality and drug-related mortality rates, researchers conducted a quasi-experimental analysis of the effects group practice of Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi had on collective stress of a larger population.

Researchers used a broken-trend intervention model with time series regression methods to estimate changes in infant mortality and drug-related mortality rates from 2002 to 2010.

When controlling for preintervention trends, seasonality and autocorrelation, researchers found significant changes in trend for infant mortality rates and drug-related mortality rates, with an average decline of 3.12% and 7.61%, respectively.

“The result of these studies, if further replicated, provide government leaders with a potential means to relieve stress on a large scale in society that is independent of structural social change and benefits public health,” the researchers wrote. “Although social stress as a mediating variable was not directly measured, the consistency of the present results with those reported previously for reduced homicide and violent crime lends support to a hypothesis of such a mediating influence.” – by Amanda Oldt

Disclosure: The researchers reported no relevant financial disclosures.