The Effects of Transcendental Meditation on Intelligence and Learning Ability

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to analyse the effects of transcendental meditation on intelligence and learning ability. Fifty-four high school students from Bangkapi School volunteered to participate in three groups of this study : regular meditators, irregular meditators and nonmeditating controls. Each group is consisted of students, with age between 16-18 years. All students were administered with the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) and one list test of nonsense syllables. Then, regular meditators practiced TM more than 50 percent of the during the four-month interval. Irregular meditators, practiced TM less than 50 percent of the time buring the four-month interval. The control group was instructed by the experimenters to sit easily with eyes closed refularly twice a day - 20 minutes in the morning and evening for the same four-month period. After four-month period, each group was administered with WAIS and the other list of nonsense syllables again. F-test and t-test were used for analysis of data. It found the regular meditators and irregular meditators showed significant increase in intelligence. The non-meditating controls showed insignificant increase in intelligence. In post-test, the mean I.Q. scores of the three groups showed significant differences. The regular meditators showed significant increase in learning ability more than the irregular meditators and non-meditating controls.