Talk:Meditation

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Scientific Studies

This section could do with an introductory health warning about not comparing apples and pears i.e. as the page makes clear meditation covers a multitude of practices and so simply referring to research on meditation is only giving half the story. Different methods of meditation will cause different effects on the physiology during meditation and after meditation according to what the person is doing. Any comments? I added in some refs on the Judaism section.Oxford73 (talk) 13:42, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I fully agree. Meditation is a really large brush with which a whole pile of things are painted. Intuitively (and scientifically) it is clear that various meditative acts affect physiology in the short term (and perhaps the long term). But lumping them all together is not correct, as you said. History2007 (talk) 13:47, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I also agree: none of the findings warrant being generalized to everything called "meditation." Of course, the current version of the scientific studies section doesn't include many claims, and most are already somewhat hedged. Including a well-crafted sentence about limits to generalizability might be an improvement. But I do not intend to endorse an opening for someone to drive in their truck and say "only method A has been proven to support health outcome X". Different methods tend often (though not always) to produce similar results on many well-being-related outcomes. Perhaps we can find a quotable published reference that concisely expresses both sides of this delicate line. -- Health Researcher (talk) 16:02, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Right. Not a trivial task, however. But then these are the early days of research on this. Remember when the 128K Mac first came out? That is where we are now. History2007 (talk) 22:57, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

I would suggest putting at the end of the 2nd para in this section something like, "When reviewing scientific research on meditation it must be remembered that different methods of meditation have various practices and goals. Even meditations that appear superficially similar, such as mantra meditation, may vary in their outcomes and goals." I would use reference 55 to support this point Taylor 1999.Oxford73 (talk) 09:27, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

I see no big deal in that, but something in the back of my mind says: there are also similarities. History2007 (talk) 13:13, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

There certainly are similarities and this is what is assumed by some of these global reviews but there are also differences as shown by all sorts of research such as EEG and in this instance it is the differences that need emphasising.Oxford73 (talk) 13:46, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it is a close call, however. History2007 (talk) 16:16, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

My sense is that phrases such as "it must be remembered" are seldom used in WP. Usually we try to state relevant facts clearly and then let readers decide what must or must not be remembered. There has never been an empirical study that looked at "all" forms of meditation, so every existing study is based on some very limited subset of meditative methods/approaches, usually only one per study. Occasionally studies have been designed to detect differences between two or more methods, often on short-term lab-based measures that are of more interest to scientists than to the public in search of improved well-being. Therefore it's much easier to be precise about a few findings of differences than about a broad background of similarity. But I think we should mention both sides of this phenomenon (both similarity+difference), supporting both with outside source citation(s), and then letting readers decide what they will choose to remember. So let's also try to find something substantive about similarities that is quotable/citeable. Health Researcher (talk) 17:52, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

PS For giving examples of different effects produced by different methods, a good source of examples is likely to be the Cahn and Polich review (ref 8), a review that I've never heard charged with tendentiousness, unlike some reviews by proponents of specific methods. Health Researcher (talk) 19:58, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

These are good points. There is a line in the 2007 NCCAM report, referred to in this section, which is in the discussion part of the report which seems to encapsulate what I am trying to get at. "The broad categories we have employed can be criticized as being simplistic and as ignoring subtle differences among practices." How about quoting this line from the report?Oxford73 (talk) 10:37, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Maybe, though a limitation of that quote is that its section (pp 194-5) does not allude to evidence for differences in effects, and we are not employing those same NCCAM categories in this article. Interesting how they use the possible role of differences as a call for "more explicit descriptions of techniques," which has long been systematically resisted by a certain well-known technique whose advocates often plead for the importance of differences between techniques. More broadly, what could we quote on the other side of the ledger, about the background of broad similarity? About not missing the "forest" of background similarity for being too caught in real or imagined differences among the "trees"? Health Researcher (talk) 16:55, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

The similarity is that they all promote spiritual development but Tai Chi and Qui Gong involve exercise which is quite different from some other techniques referred to. Even with 2 mantra meditations the outcomes can be different. It is something like the "butterfly effect". Small differences in initial conditions can have a huge effect later on. Related to this I came across a critique of the this study in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine 2008 and it articulates some of my concerns more clearly than my original statement about apples and pears. I wonder if that critique is worth a sentence? Oxford73 (talk) 08:53, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

The butterfly effect item seems interesting. Could you say more please? History2007 (talk) 09:07, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

An analogy would be aiming a rocket to go to the moon. A small degree out when it leaves earth could have a big consequences later on unless it is self-correcting. Meditations may appear superficially similar eg using a mantra but the specific instructions followed by the meditator can make a difference which is one reason why different physiological measurements are found with different meditations. More to the point are weaknesses in the 2007 report which I think merit a mention.Oxford73 (talk) 09:09, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

I have studied the butterfly effect and the mathematical issues therein for years - a fascinating topic. More interesting cases involve more complexity than rockets, but that is another story. But I do not have exact info or even a semi-scientific discussion about how that translates into meditation. Any more specific items you may have? History2007 (talk) 09:17, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Remember that people don't pursue meditation in a vacuum. Serious meditators commonly engage in some sort of spiritual fellowship with those on the same path, as well as other allied disciplines, such as practice of virtues (compassion, forgiveness, etc). This makes it extremely difficult to empirically distinguish effects of differences in what is done within the time set aside for meditation versus effects from what is done in the supporting practices (also versus, of course, some sort of synergy between the two). Speaking of a "butterfly effect" risks being misleading because there's nowhere near the same level of determinism and high-precision predictiveness possible in human studies as is possible in physics - at least not of the kind being suggested here. Thus, talk of "butterfly effects" remains theoretically rather than empirically based, which means that every school of meditation is free to offer its own theory, if it so desires, about why its method might be most intrinsically effective as a technical procedure. But unless there's a cogent scientific argument involved, persuasive to those outside of the school itself, there's little to distinguish such assertions from simple self-serving biases, regardless of how sincere they might be. I'm not aware of any such arguments in the scientific literature that have gained significant traction. Of course, researchers such as Goleman (who we cite) have long conceptualized the training of attention as the distinguishing feature of meditation in general, that helps distinguish/characterize meditation -- and the training of attention is a conception that is quite alive in the literature (see Wadlinger et al, 2010). -- Health Researcher (talk) 16:00, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Also: Some of the most interesting work in comparing different methods comes from primarily Christian samples, comparing what might be called a spiritual mantra versus a secular mantra as a focus for meditation. These are two studies by Wachholtz and Pargament (2005, 2008). They suggest that the spiritual mantra may have produced better results because it activates a spiritual "lens" through which the world can be interpreted. Such a spiritual lens could naturally lead to intensified application to spiritual fellowship and virtues, and thus there is a theoretical basis for believing there could be long-term differences as well as the observed short term diffferences. But note that many different meditative systems encourage fellowship and virtues, and would help activate a spiritual "lens". I think I've read that argument somewhere, but don't have time to track it down. But how much of this will meet WP:DUE for our tiny tiny bit of space on this page, is unclear. -- Health Researcher (talk) 16:10, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

We still have not addressed the question: What are the best citations for characterizing the broad common background of similar findings of positive effects that are evident across many methods. I contend this is "half the story" of characterizing the relationship between different methods. Let's not lose ourselves in focusing on the fascinating "trees" of differences, and forget to address the other half of the forest. -- Health Researcher (talk) 16:13, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

You had a very good point about meditation not taking place in a vacuum. And I think the article is missing that. Please feel free to add something about that. In fact, even secular meditation has some type of context.

On a separate note, and let us not get side tracked here, the butterfly effect (not a great Wikipage) is about the lack of "determinism and high-precision predictiveness" in the physical world. FYI: for over a century, the three-body problem issues (also not a good Wikipage!) have dogged physicists, only to be reincarnated at the subatomic level - but that is another story. That was why I hinted that the rocket (or bullet) example was too simple. Physics is far less deterministic than people expect. So meditation by its nature will be even less deterministic. History2007 (talk) 16:34, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

AHRQ Report

The article in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine (2008) makes a few criticisms of the 2007 Alberta report as follows; It mixed mental techniques - meditation - with those that had a more physical component such as Tai Chi, it didn't distinguish well enough between studies with and without good controls, criticised studies for not being double blind when that is very tricky with these sorts of experiments, and it did not look at effects of meditation on smoking, alcohol and drug abuse.Oxford73 (talk) 15:42, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

I think that it is good that the JACM critique you list has been published. It is by a prominent TM researcher, which does not mean it is irrelevant to Wikipedia, but to my mind means we should be extra careful to be citing it for the right reasons (if we cite it at all), since TM is known to have a strong promotional effort. It's possible that it would be worth citing over at the Research on meditation page, but not here, since space here is very limited. Furthermore, if we mention here any of what the critique says, we should make sure there is no disconnect with what we are doing here. For example, the AHRQ report says "The categories are only meant to be descriptive and conclusions have not been made on the basis of the broad categories, but at the level of individual practices." (p. 209). So if we don't cite the AHRQ report's broad categories -- which I don't think this page does at present -- then it could be a red herring (or an attack on a straw man) to cite the Orme-Johnson critique of the AHRQ's broad categories. The critique itself has only been cited 2 times on Google Book, so it doesn't have much stand-alone notability - though it's useful as one of the few if not the only published critiques of the AHRQ report.

Let me add that personally, I agree in the abstract with a number of things the critique says -- it provides what might be a useful checklist of methodological desiderata -- but it's often hard to tell how much the AHRQ conclusions might have been modified by following such suggestions. And as usual with TM research productions, it gives enormous attention to TM as an illustrative example, and minimal attention to anything else. Health Researcher (talk) 19:09, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

There we go again: east and west

I called a BRD on east/west separation, so let us repeat our semi-annual discussion on that. I used to want the separation, but I was convinced otherwise before. So, gentlemen, get your keyboards ready. History2007 (talk) 08:18, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Definition

The current definition "trains his or her mind or self-induces a mode of consciousness in order to realize some benefit" is very sloppy and colloquial. Isn't there a more sophisticated definition? Shouldn't it refer in some way to meditation being, in essence, the exercise in trying to consciously control bodily functions which are normally subconscious? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.197.15.138 (talk) 20:18, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

You may be right that it is overly colloquial. But whatever is suggested as an alternative should be informed by the definitions from the highly-cited publications -- definitions that are quoted in the table in the Definitions section. I don't think "bodily functions" would be an appropriate phrase -- only one of those definitions mentions the "body" and to me that usage seems slightly strange. Meditation typically primarily references what one does with one's mind. Personally I would agree with your implication that meditation can result in bringing into consciousness of things that have previously been unconscious. But that doesn't seem to be how meditation is usually defined, at least not in those definitions in highly-cited publications. They mention attention, but not the unconscious. -- Health Researcher (talk) 00:20, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

I agree, but I think we should put a comment in the text somewhere (perhaps as a note below) that we have danced this dance before, discussed the WP:RS issues at length, etc. Otherwise the response above needs to be provided every few months. Given that you crafted the current definition, and know more about the topic anyway, would you like to put together a few sentences as a "note" that would go at the end to answer a similar question that will be asked in 6 months? Thanks. History2007 (talk) 02:40, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

History2007, thanks for inserting that note, that looks good. -- Health Researcher (talk) 16:02, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Actually that was a comment inside the page that I added, I was hoping to also have a visible footnote saying: "definition of meditation is hard... etc." but was not sure how to say that with a suitable reference. History2007 (talk) 16:07, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Meditation isn't always about controlling bodily functions. Bodily functions are affected by meditation but sometimes as a spontaneous by product of practice and not by deliberate manipulation. This is the problem of trying to define a word that is used in so many different ways by different traditions.Oxford73 (talk) 13:03, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Stress

By chance I came across a book on stress published by the British Medical Association. It gives a good recommendation to meditation and its a very good source. It is written by Professor G Wilkinson at Liverpool University.Oxford73 (talk) 15:24, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I guess it is this. There are a few more as well. History2007 (talk) 16:41, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

The stress issue reminded me of an old joke/truism: "the only people who can borrow money with ease are those who do not need it." Similarly, it seems like the case that those who can be helped by meditation are those "ready to meditate" and that a very nervous and stressed person can hardly begin. Is there any referenced basis for that?

Traditionally monks were kept separate so they would not be subject to the "corrupting" stress of others, and the Rule of Benedict did not even allow them to eat with seculars unless they were too far away from the monastery.

So is there a basis to the statement that benefiting from meditation may need a "conducive state" beforehand? Ideas? History2007 (talk) 18:43, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

There may be empirical documentation for some of those ideas that you mention, though off the top of my head I can't think of any. In the jargon of health/social science research, you are suggesting that various conditions such as pre-existing stress might be a "moderator" (aka "effect modifier") of benefits from meditation. Some "moderators", such as level of preexisting spirituality/religiousness, have been seen in some populations with some methods. Offhand, I don't recall such documentation for stress level as a moderator; and in terms of the most stressed people, often they are the ones most motivated to enroll in something they think they might help them, so I suspect there's ample documentation that highly stressed people can benefit from meditation. Remember also that quite a number of meditation studies are randomized, which means that there are clearly benefits; the question is how widely they generalize to other people. Because meditation studies (like other studies of human subjects) rely on voluntary enrollment, one may, within reason, validly question whether such benefits would generalize to people who would never consider enrolling in such a study (but the same is true for other human subjects studies). Of course, to the extent that meditation is an activity where "you get out what you put in" - like so many human activities - then one important moderator may be one's readiness to seriously put in effort and follow instructions. -- Presearch (talk) 00:51, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. But in passing I should remark that "one's readiness to seriously put in effort" is itself often affected by the initial payback encountered. Given an initial effort L, some people get back X while others get back (X + delta), and the second group is more likely to spend more effort to continue, if delta pushes them over some threshold. As for randomization, one can not randomize based on variables one does not know about, e.g. if First name is a modifier (who said it is not) then they had probably not randomized based on that. But I will not start on that topic... it could take a year pf discussion. And given that there are no major studies, based on your experience, we should pass on this, but I would conjecture that in time it will emerge that different people also have different levels of ability to "experience meditation". As GBS said: "men are wise not in relation to their experience, but in relation to their ability for experience". History2007 (talk) 06:09, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

It's true that "one can not randomize based on variables one does not know about", but one doesn't need to randomize on them. In fact, simple randomization does not involve dealing with subject variables at all. On average, randomization equalizes between groups both measured and unmeasured variables of all kinds. That's part of why it's regarded as a gold standard for causal inference. --Presearch (talk) 16:17, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I wish I had not commented on that. I really wish. So I will stop after this. But I used to be in the business of utilizing the general errors made by the statistical community at large - and I consider that an error by the community at large, i.e. 90% of statistical users believe in it. So I will leave it there. the heart of that also goes to the heart of bell curves, and these fellows had an interesting take on bell curves. But it is really beside the point on this page. So I will just stop on that topic given that it is unrelated to meditation. History2007 (talk) 16:30, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, this talk page isn't a proper location (we could adjourn to your or my talk page if we want to continue). But I'd agree that RCTs are not the only important story in town for inferring causality (even within science, see Bradford-Hill criteria, and Levin, 1996). -- Presearch (talk) 16:21, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I meant to say the Wilkinson source is in effect a tertiary source.Oxford73 (talk) 09:47, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

My comment was not about Wilkinson in itself, but wanted to see if anyone had studied the "inherent ability" and "current positioning" of a person with respect to meditation. Some people will make better musicians than other, regardless of training. I wondered if some people make better meditators than others - regardless of training. History2007 (talk) 10:25, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Recently posted the following: In his book Understanding Stress, Professor G, Wilkinson of Liverpool University,notes that meditation in general is good for coping with migraine and high blood pressue and that Transcendental Meditation reduces tension, lowers anxiety and increases work performance and satisfaction. Presesearch decided to delete it. Don't mind posts being reverted but would appreciate an explanation. Without any explanation then I will repost it.Oxford73 (talk) 09:19, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Clarification

In the 2nd para of the intro there is note asking for more clarification on the sentence that the same word meditation can be used for both the path and the goal. I assume that the person who wrote the sentence was meaning that the word meditation can be used to signify both the process of the mind becoming less excited and the state of the mind when it reaches the point of least excitation. Any suggestions.Oxford73 (talk) 10:54, 6 June 2011 (UTC)