June 13, 2017 – Meditation for Men and Women

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Anchor lead: Do men and women respond to meditation differently? Elizabeth Tracey reports

The practice of mediation has different effects on college aged men and women, a recent study concluded, with women seeming to improve more in things like anxiety and depression after learning and practicing the skill.  Meera Goyal, an internal medicine expert at Johns Hopkins and meditation researcher, says the jury is still out.

Goyal: Women tended to improve in negative affect more so than the men did. I think that it’s a fairly preliminary study. I wouldn’t take this as bona fide evidence that men and women definitely process these meditation skills differently. But I think it raises the possibility that men and women may process these skills that they learn in meditation on how to deal with certain emotions they may process these somewhat differently.   :29

Goyal says his own research demonstrates benefits for all, so he encourages the practice universally. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.