Meditation training can boost well-being in older adults, trial finds

Following an 18-month meditation program can improve the well-being of older people, reveals a new randomized controlled trial by an international team co-led by University College London (UCL).

The results, published in PLOS ONEshow that meditation can improve people’s awareness, connection to others, and insight.

Although meditation training did not provide significant benefits on two commonly used measures of psychological well-being and quality of life, the researchers say their findings could reveal the limitations of existing methods of tracking well-being. -be.

Lead author Marco Schlosser (UCL Psychiatry and University of Geneva) said: “As the global population ages, it is increasingly crucial to understand how we can help older people maintain and deepen their well-being. be psychological. Long-term meditation training can improve important dimensions of well-being. Our results suggest that meditation is a promising non-pharmacological approach to supporting human flourishing in late life.

The study is the longest randomized trial of meditation training conducted to date and explored the impact of an 18-month meditation program on the psychological well-being of more than 130 healthy older French-speaking people. from 65 to 84 years old.

The study, led by principal investigator Professor Gaël Chételat, took place in Caen, France. It was carried out by the edit-Aging research group (Silver Santé Study) which involves UCL, Inserm, the University of Geneva, the University of Caen Normandy, the Lyon Neuroscience Research Center, the the University of Liège, the Technische Universität Dresden and the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena.

Researchers compared a meditation program comprising a nine-month mindfulness module followed by a nine-month loving-kindness and compassion module, delivered through weekly group sessions (two hours duration), daily home practice (at least 20 minutes) and a one-day retreat, with a group having received English language training (as a comparison group) and a control group without intervention.

The team found that meditation training had a significant impact on an overall score measuring the well-being dimensions of awareness, connection and insight. Mindfulness describes undistracted, intimate attention to one’s thoughts, feelings, and surroundings, which can promote a sense of calm and deep contentment.

Connection captures feelings such as respect, gratitude, and kinship that can foster more positive relationships with others. Insight refers to self-knowledge and an understanding of how thoughts and feelings help shape our perception and how to transform unhelpful thought patterns related to ourselves and the world.

The benefits of meditation training on an established measure of psychological quality of life were no greater than those of English learning, while neither intervention had any significant impact. significant impact on another widely used measure of psychological well-being.

The researchers suggest that this may be because these two established measures do not cover the qualities and depth of human flourishing that can potentially be cultivated through long-term meditation training, so the benefits in terms of awareness, connection and insight are missed.

The program did not benefit everyone equally, as participants who reported lower levels of psychological well-being at the start of the trial showed greater improvements compared to those who already had lower levels of psychological well-being. higher levels of well-being.

Co-author Dr Natalie Marchant (UCL Psychiatry) said: “We hope that further research will clarify which people are most likely to benefit from meditation training, as this could confer greater benefits to certain specific groups. Now that we have evidence that meditation training can help older adults, we hope that further improvements in partnership with colleagues from other research disciplines could make meditation programs even more beneficial.

Lead author Dr Antoine Lutz (Lyon Neuroscience Research Center, Inserm, France) said: “By showing the potential of meditation programs, our results pave the way for more targeted and effective programs that can helping older people thrive, as we seek to go further. beyond just preventing disease or health issues, and instead take a holistic approach to helping people across the full spectrum of human well-being.