The National Center for Complementary and Integrated Health, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, has highlighted a need for research to better understand the usage of complementary and alternative medicine practices. The purpose of this study was to investigate the flow of complementary and alternative medicine information among yoga practitioners. The study consisted of 51 yoga practitioners from 7 yoga studio locations. This mixed-methods study used interviews, surveys, and field notes to collect data. Content and social network analyses provided supporting evidence for Rogers' diffusion of innovations theory and Granovetter's strength of weak ties theory. Key findings included a preference for face-to-face communications, students having both strong and weak relationship ties to directors and instructors, and yoga being the top recommended practice. The study suggested that yoga practitioners related to complementary and alternative medicine information through the lens of their friends and relatives, sought information from trusted sources, and used this information to determine which practices were right for them to pursue.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-04T18:29:42Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Marilia Goncalves.pdf: 1694793 bytes, checksum: 3459e5f3f7b77ee826c92db064ee781a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008-02-13 / The present study aimed at carrying out a psychoanalytical investigation of the collective imaginary of yoga teachers by identifying their imaginative conceptions of psychological equilibrium and by capturing the non-conscious psychological fields from which they emerge. This research study took place through a differentiated psychoanalytical framework called individualizad meetings to approach the social personation and was consolidated with the help of the following dialog mediators: accounts of life stories and the thematicstory-drawing procedure. The clinical material produced during these meetings was later analyzed psychoanalytically through the light of the field theory, which led to the identification of imaginative conceptions which articulate in the following nonconscious fields: the field of a happy childhood, the field of fruition, the field of asceticism, and the field of devotion, indicating the particular manners in which the people whom we talked with, forge their conceptions of psychological equilibrium during their training as yoga teachers in the light of their own personal needs and the Eastern doctrines to which they had access. / O presente trabalho teve como objetivo investigar psicanaliticamente o imagin?rio coletivo de professores de Ioga, por meio da identifica??o de concep??es imaginativas sobre equil?brio psicol?gico e da capta??o dos campos psicol?gicos n?o conscientes, a partir dos quais emergem. O material cl?nico foi produzido no contexto de entrevista individual para a abordagem da pessoalidade coletiva, consolidando-se por meio do uso de dois procedimentos dial?gicos: a Narrativa da Hist?ria de Vida e o Procedimento de Desenhos-Est?rias com Tema. Foram criados/encontrados os seguintes campos: frui??o, devo??o, ascese e inf?ncia feliz. O quadro geral permite concluir que os modos particulares pelos quais s?o forjadas as concep??es imaginativas, articulam tentativas de atendimento a necessidades emocionais pessoais, conhecimento das doutrinas orientais e apropria??o de id?ias psicanal?ticas socialmente circulantes.