Effect of listening to vedic chanting on state anxiety and mindfulness

Abstract

Contexts: The Vedic mantras are becoming popular and used for healing and spiritual growth all over the world. Aims: To study the immediate effect of listening to Vedic chanting (Rudram Mantras) on state anxiety and state mindfulness. Settings and Design: A randomized self-as-control within subjects design was employed. Fifty four undergraduate male students from a residential Yoga University in Southern India were recruited for this study. Their age ranged from 17 to 37 years with a mean age of 23.11 years (SD= 4.48). Methods and Material: The State Anxiety Inventory-Short Form and State Mindful Attention Awareness Scale (SMAAS) were used to measure the psychological states. They were assessed immediately before and after two sessions listening of 1) Vedic chanting 2) relaxation instrumental music with equal time (20 min) duration. 50% of student select randomly listen the Vedic chanting and remaining 50% student listen the relaxation instrumental music on first day. In second day orders of the sessions were reverse. Results: There was a significant improvement in state mindfulness and reduction in state anxiety following listening to Vedic chanting. The state anxiety reduced significantly after the relaxation music, but there was no change on state mindfulness. Conclusions: These findings indicate listening to Vedic chanting results in enhancement of state mindfulness and reduction in state anxiety.