The design of RCTs for meditation (or any behaviour-based therapy for that matter) involves a number of unique challenges compared with pharmacological trials. While both categories of trial use an inactive placebo, the pharmaceutical trial uses an inert “sugar tablet” which appears similar to the medication being administered. The participant…
Sham meditation involves designing control strategies that overtly resemble the intervention, but which do not actually trigger the effects purported to be specifically associated with meditation. Sham techniques are used in research when the researcher wishes to examine the specific effects a meditation technique may elicit, while controlling for the…
It seems logical that experienced meditators would be more likely to be able to generate the experiential and physiological changes associated with meditation at a magnitude sufficient for detection; however selecting them from the wider population necessarily precludes the use of randomisation. This weakens the likelihood that the intervention and…
The many reviews thorough and reliable reviews of of meditation enable us to make some basic generalisations: First, there is insufficient evidence to support the idea that meditation, as conceived and tested by scientific researchers in the West, is any more effective than simple relaxation or rest. Second, the use of…
