Meditation

Meditation Programs for Psychological Stress and Well-being

Goyal M, Singh S, Sibinga EMS, et al. · JAMA Internal Medicine, 2014

This systematic review and meta-analysis looked at whether meditation programs improve stress-related outcomes in adults with various health conditions. The authors screened over 18,000 citations and included 47 randomized trials with 3,515 participants, focusing on studies with active control groups to account for placebo effects. In this review, mindfulness meditation programs showed moderate evidence of small improvements in anxiety, depression and pain, and low evidence for improved stress and mental health-related quality of life. There was little or no evidence of effects on positive mood, attention, sleep, eating or weight, and meditation was not found to be better than other active treatments such as medication or exercise. The authors call for stronger study designs.

Our summaries describe what each study found. They are not medical advice, and the practices at Halcyon are not a treatment for any condition.