Researchers who are studying meditation techniques are reaffirming that meditation helps people who practice it. The studies reveal that meditation helps individuals adapt more easily by remembering facts and figures, staying cool under stress, and maintaining focus on goals.

In a constantly challenging economic climate, without a doubt many people could really benefit from learning how to meditate if not for spiritual reasons, perhaps more for practical applications.

The evidence shows that a meditator develops a brain wave that screens out distraction, which could explain their superior ability to rapidly remember and incorporate new facts when under the pressure of performance according to a Harvard study.

In the study, the reporter makes a profound observation in favor of meditation in academic environments or workplaces:

“The positive effects of mindfulness meditation on pain and working memory may result from an improved ability to regulate a crucial brain wave called the alpha rhythm. This rhythm is thought to “turn down the volume” on distracting information, which suggests that a key value of meditation may be helping the brain deal with an often overstimulating world.”

In other developments in the field of meditation, doctors from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Harvard Medical School, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used a protocol to measure the modulation of the alpha rhythm in response to attention-directing cues. The results were that the responses were faster and significantly more enhanced among study participants who completed an eight-week mindfulness meditation program than in a control group. The study will appear in the journal Brain Research Bulletin and has been released online.

The Harvard article goes on to document how some researchers are making important insights into meditation:

“Mindfulness meditation has been reported to enhance numerous mental abilities, including rapid memory recall,” says Catherine Kerr of the Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging at MGH and the Osher Research Center at Harvard Medical School (HMS), co-lead author of the report. “Our discovery that mindfulness meditators more quickly adjusted the brain wave that screens out distraction could explain their superior ability to rapidly remember and incorporate new facts.”

Learn more from the original Meditation article.

How Meditation Works

Brain cells use specific frequencies, to regulate streams of information in much the same way that radio stations broadcast at specific frequencies. One frequency, the alpha rhythm, is very active in the cells that process touch, sight, and sound in the brain’s outer layer, called the cortex, where it helps to suppress irrelevant or distracting sensations and direct the flow of sensory input between brain regions.

Since meditation partly involves willfully calming the mind in the absence or deprivation of activity, the alpha rhythm has the space to recalibrate and be directed by the willful intent of the practicing meditator. The process, when he or she practices it over time, has the ability to  impact the way cells handle neuro-peptides and regrow new cells that are conducive to more productive neuronal activity.

Meditation is commonly practiced by the simple process of staying still, and shielding the eyes from sensory input (usually by closing them). Many yoga and Hindu based techniques use the lotus position in meditation, however this is not the only form.

In the above study, sound input was not part of this formal research in meditation, however many researchers with scientific training have published findings that clearly show how certain sound stimulus such as binaural beats enhances the meditation process.

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