Why Meditation Reduced Chronic Pain

A recent investigation conducted by researchers in the United States finally reveals a possible explanation for why practicing meditation helps those suffering from chronic pain experience a diminishing of their symptoms.

The correlation was observed in numerous studies, but thus far experts could not pinpoint the exact mechanism that set the foundation for this correlation. A collaboration of experts from the Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) believes it may have the answer.

In the new study, they managed to pinpoint some of the neural mechanisms that allowed meditation to quell chronic pain. Details of the work appear in the April 21 online issue of the renowned scientific journal Brain Research Bulletin.

According to the research team, people who did not practice meditation before, but who were instructed in this art for 8 weeks, became capable of influencing the activity of alpha rhythms, which are a specific type of brain waves.

“These activity patterns are thought to minimize distractions, to diminish the likelihood stimuli will grab your attention,” explains MIT neuroscientist and senior paper author Christopher Moore.

“Our data indicate that meditation training makes you better at focusing, in part by allowing you to better regulate how things that arise will impact you,” the expert goes on to say.

Previous investigations determined that alpha waves play an important role in inhibiting or suppressing distracting and irrelevant information. The human brain emits a variety of waves, each of which is responsible for a specific task.

You can think about these types of waves as a series of radio stations, each of them emitting its own show on its specific wavelength. The new investigation was focused exclusively on alpha rhythms.

According to the lead author of the new study, Harvard Medical School instructor Catherine Kerr, people in the study also reported feeling less stress after they began practicing meditation.

“Their objective condition might not have changed, but they’re not as reactive to their situation. They’re more able to handle stress. They’re really learning to maintain and control their attention during the early part of the course,” Kerr explains.

“For example, they learn to focus sustained attention to the sensations of the breath; they also learn to engage and focus on body sensations in a specific area, such as the bottom of the feet, and then they practice disengaging and shifting the focus to another body area,” she concludes.