Meditating is an activity that gives us calm, well-being, and helps us fight daily stress. With only 20 minutes a day of meditation regularly, in a few weeks we can experience its benefits in our health and well-being.
But, although its benefits are globally accepted, there are still few scientific studies that confirm the changes, better yet, that meditation has on our physical and mental health.
Now, a study published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine comes to light in this field. The study’s authors, researchers from the University of Wisconsin, United States, have conducted a controlled study on the effects of meditation on the brain and immune function. In particular, they have studied the effects of an 8-week clinical training of mindfulness meditation on a group of employees from the same working environment.
To reach their conclusions, the researchers measured the electrical activity of the brain before and immediately after performing the activity. They also took data on this activity after 4 months of starting the program and compared them with data from other employees who had not done meditation. By the end of the 8-week program, all the workers who had participated in the research were vaccinated against the flu.
Meditation activates the left side of the brain
The result was revealing. According to the study authors, for the first time, they were able to report significant increases in left-sided anterior activation. This means that meditation increases activity in the prefrontal cortex, the right anterior insula, and the right hippocampus. These are the parts of the brain that control positive emotions, consciousness, and anxiety, in addition to acting on the immune system.
They also observed significant increases in antibodies against the flu vaccine among subjects who had meditated on an ongoing basis. And not only that, but the increase in activation on the left side made it possible to predict the magnitude of the increase in the antibodies for the vaccine in these people.
According to the report’s authors, “These findings demonstrate that a short mindfulness meditation program produces demonstrable effects on immune and brain function.“ They add that these findings “suggest that meditation can positively change brain and immune system function.”
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