Over the past 30 years, the benefits of mindfulness practice have been widely researched. Mindfulness has been demonstrated to be effective in improving emotional, psychological and physical health, wellbeing and resilience, and to improve overall functioning.  

Overall health, wellbeing and functioning
Research has demonstrated mindfulness training is effective in reducing stress and burnout, and increasing general wellbeing, life satisfaction and positive mood.  Mindfulness meditation has been demonstrated to improve clarity of perception, sustained focus and concentration, improved memory and enhanced executive functioning. People also report an increased ability to cope with both short and long term stressors in their lives.

Anxiety, depression and other psychological issues
A large study (covering 1,140 participants) into the effectiveness of mindfulness based therapies (MBT) for anxiety and mood problems found that MBTs improve symptoms of anxiety and depression across a wide range of severity, even when these symptoms are associated with other problems such as chronic medical conditions, with effect sizes moderate to large. Mindfulness training was found to be effective in enhancing the capacity to let go of negative thoughts, and was found equally effective as anti-depressants in preventing relapse for recurrent major depression.

Research also suggests that mindfulness practice is effective in preventing relapse among people recovering from substance abuse like drugs and alcohol.

 

Brain functioning
Research has demonstrated that mindfulness meditation results in changes in both the structure as well as the functioning of areas of the brain associated with the integration of emotion and cognitions, self-awareness, positive emotions and adaptive responding.

 

Interpersonal
An increase in mindfulness has also been shown to increase one’s ability for empathy and compassion, both for oneself and others, to improve emotional intelligence and to improve interpersonal functioning and relationships.

 

Chronic health problems
There is also a large body of research demonstrating the effectiveness of mindfulness practice in alleviating both the psychological and physical symptoms of a wide range of chronic health problems. 

A wellknown and widely used 8-week mindfulness training program (Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction or MBSR) has been shown effective in alleviating physical symptoms and reducing the level of psychological distress experienced for a wide range of chronic health problems such as chronic pain, heart disease, high blood pressure, cancer, fibromyalgia, diabetes, headaches, Irritable Bowel Syndrome, Respiratory Disorders, psoriasis and multiple sclerosis.

Research has also demonstrated an improvement in the functioning of the immune system.

MBSR has been shown to reduce both the experience of pain and its inhibition of people’s everyday activities. Further, psychological problems related to the physical health problems such as anxiety and depression were also reduced. The use of pain killers and other drugs was decreased and activity levels and self esteem increased. These gains were nearly all maintained at four-year follow-up.