Meditation, well-being and cognition in heartfulness meditators - A pilot study.

Meditative practices can vary considerably in technique as well as their effects. Heartfulness is a popular meditation technique that includes in its repertoire, a unique passive form of meditation. We carried out a pilot study recruiting male heartfulness meditators (proficient n = 24, with 6-28 years of meditation experience; novice n = 24, 5 to 16 months of experience) and subsequently recruited matched controls (n = 15). We examined well-being, and carried out high-density EEG recordings to examine indices of meditation and cognition in these groups. Well-being scores were significantly higher for the proficient meditators as compared to novice and intermediate for the controls. We did not find any group differences in cognitive processing. During meditation, enhanced occipital gamma was found in proficient meditators as compared to controls. We discuss the findings from this pilot study and suggest avenues for future research.