East Meet West in Study on Effects of Stress
By Kathi Baker
“I have long believed in and
advocated a dialogue and cross fertilization between science and
spirituality, as both are essential for enriching human life and
alleviating suffering on both individual and global levels.”
– H.H. the Dalai Lam
Since its founding in 1998 the Emory-Tibet Partnership has expanded
to include affiliations with the Institute of Buddhist Dialetics,
the home of Emory’s study abroad program in Dharamsala,
and the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, who are collaborating
with Emory on a groundbreaking Emory-Tibet Science Initiative
to develop and implement a comprehensive science education curriculum
for Tibetan monastic institutions.
The latest advancement in this partnership involves Geshe Lobsang
Tenzin Negi, PhD, senior lecturer in the Department of Religion
at Emory University, and Charles Raison, MD, from the Department
of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Emory University School
of Medicine. Serving as co-directors of the Emory Collaborative
for Contemplative Studies, their research builds on studies that
show people who perceive themselves as part of a social network
are healthier happier individuals.
Raison specializes in scientific studies that show how stress
and sickness promote the development of depression through activation
of the body’s innate immune system. Negi earned the highest
degree of learning in Tibetan Buddhism, the degree of Geshe Lharampa,
from Drepung Loseling Monastery and received his PhD from Emory’s
Graduate Institute for the Liberal Arts in 1999. His dissertation
centered on traditional Buddhist and contemporary Western approaches
to emotions and their impact on health. In addition to teaching
at Emory, he serves as spiritual director of Drepung Loseling
Monastery, Inc., which has been affiliated with Emory University
since 1998.
In 2005, the two decided to meld their respective educational
and cultural backgrounds and their common interests in Tibetan
Buddhist practices into an initial study of compassion meditation.
They applied for, and received, funding to begin a small pilot
study with students at Emory University. The study focused on
the effect of compassion meditation on inflammatory, neuroendocrine
and behavioral responses to psychosocial stress, and evaluated
the degree to which engagement in meditation practice influenced
stress reactivity.
Raison hypothesized that compassion meditation would reduce inflammatory
responses to stress because of evidence that positive social connectivity
is associated with reduced inflammation. He believes that compassion
meditation seen from a certain perspective “is the world’s
most radical training in re-envisioning one’s social surroundings
as being supporting and caring rather than threatening and dangerous.”
Negi, who designed and taught the meditation program used in the
study, says that while much attention has been paid to meditation
practices that emphasize calming the mind, improving focused attention
or developing mindfulness, less is known about meditation practices
designed to specifically foster compassion.
Although secular in presentation, the compassion meditation program
was based on a thousand-year-old Tibetan Buddhist mind-training
practice called “lojong” in Tibetan. “Lojong
practices utilize a cognitive, analytic approach to challenge
an individual’s unexamined thoughts and emotions toward
other people, with the long-term goal of developing altruistic
emotions and behavior towards all people,” explains Negi.
Sixty-one healthy college students between the ages of 17 and
19 participated in the study. Half the participants were randomized
to receive six weeks of compassion meditation training and half
were randomized to a health discussion control group. Each meditation
class session combined teaching, discussion and meditation practice.
The control group attended classes designed by study investigators
on topics relevant to the mental and physical health of college
students such as stress management, drug abuse and eating disorders.
In addition, a variety of student participation activities were
employed such as mock debates and role-playing. Both groups were
required to participate in 12 hours of classes across the study
period. Meditators were provided with a meditation compact disc
for practice at home. Homework for the control group was a weekly
self-improvement paper.
After the study interventions were finished, the students participated
in a laboratory stress test designed to investigate how the body’s
inflammatory and neuroendocrine systems respond to psychosocial
stress. No differences were seen between students randomized to
compassion meditation and the control group, but within the meditation
group there was a strong relationship between the time spent practicing
meditation and reductions in inflammation and emotional distress
in response to the stressor.
“Our findings suggest that meditation practices designed
to foster compassion may impact physiological pathways that are
modulated by stress and are relevant to disease,” says Raison.
Consistent with this, when the meditation group was divided into
high and low practice groups, participants in the high practice
group showed reductions in inflammation and distress in response
to the stressor when compared to the low practice group and the
control group.
Despite these promising findings, the researchers caution that
it will require conducting stress tests before and after meditation
training in order to conclusively show it was the practice of
compassion meditation that resulted in reduced stress responses.
“These initial results are exciting,” says Raison.
“If further studies show that practicing compassion meditation
reduces inflammatory responses to stress, we believe it may offer
real promise not only as a method of reducing the number and severity
of health conditions associated with stress and inflammation,
it also may help people deal with illness in a way that could
help boost the healing process.”
Negi concurs. He says the findings have encouraged them to begin
compassion meditation classes for patients at Emory Winship Cancer
Institute. In addition, they have plans to partner with the Emory
Predictive Health Institute to study potential long-term effects
of compassion meditation on health and wellbeing.
Study data was published online in the journal Psychoneuroendocrinolgy
and is available at www.sciencedirect.com
Kathi Baker is the associate director and manager of broadcast relations,
Emory Health Sciences Communications.
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