Several religious traditions have suggested that mediation does just that, but there has been no scientific proof\u2014until now.<\/p>\n In this study, a team of researchers from Northeastern University and Harvard University examined the effects meditation would have on compassion and virtuous behavior, and the results were fascinating.<\/p>\n This study\u2014funded by the Mind and Life Institute\u2014invited participants to complete eight-week trainings in two types of meditation<\/strong>. After the sessions, they were put to the test.<\/p>\n Sitting in a staged waiting room with three chairs were two actors. With one empty chair left, the participant sat down and waited to be called. Another actor using crutches and appearing to be in great physical pain, would then enter the room<\/strong>.\u00a0 As she did, the actors in the chair would ignore her by fiddling with their phones or opening a book.<\/p>\n The question DeSteno and Paul Condon \u2013 a graduate student in DeSteno\u2019s lab who led the study \u2013 and their team wanted to answer was whether the subjects who took part in the meditation classes would be more likely to come to the aid of the person in pain, even in the face of everyone else ignoring her. \u201cWe know meditation improves a person\u2019s own physical and psychological wellbeing,\u201d said Condon. \u201cWe wanted to know whether it actually increases compassionate behavior.<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n Among the non-meditating participants, only about 15 percent of people acted to help. But among the participants who were in the meditation sessions \u201cwe were able to boost that up to 50 percent<\/b>,\u201d said DeSteno.\u00a0 This result was true for both meditation groups thereby showing the effect to be consistent across different forms of meditation.<\/p>\n \u201cThe truly surprising aspect of this finding is that meditation made people willing to act virtuous \u2013 to help another who was suffering \u2013 even in the face of a norm not to do so<\/strong>,\u201d DeSteno said, \u201cThe fact that the other actors were ignoring the pain creates as \u2018bystander-effect\u2019 that normally tends to reduce helping.\u00a0 People often wonder \u2018Why should I help someone if no one else is?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n These results appear to prove what the Buddhist theologians have long believed\u2014that meditation is supposed to lead you to experience more compassion and love for all sentient beings.\u00a0 But even for non-Buddhists, the findings offer scientific proof for meditation techniques to alter the calculus of the moral mind.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" From the Northeastern University press release via EurekAlert!: Scientists have mostly focused on the benefits of meditation for the brain and the body, but a recent study by Northeastern University\u2019s… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[189,38,12],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11936"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11936"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11936\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12021,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11936\/revisions\/12021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"athlete](\"http:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/athlete_meditation.jpg\")
<\/a>Scientists have mostly focused on the benefits of meditation for the brain and the body, but a recent study by Northeastern University\u2019s David DeSteno, published in Psychological Science,<\/i> takes a look at what impacts meditation has on interpersonal harmony and compassion<\/strong>.<\/p>\nThe study
\n<\/b><\/h3>\nMeditation works
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