Syfte och frågeställningar Syftet med studien var att undersöka idag utövade fysiska aktiviteter med inslag av själslig hälsa. För att uppfylla vårt syfte använde vi oss av följande frågeställningar: Hur definierar ledare och deltagare inom dessa aktiviteter själslig hälsa respektive ohälsa? Hur anses aktiviteterna enligt ledare och utövare bidra till själslig hälsa? Vad i dessa aktiviteter är det som lockar deltagarna? Metod Studien har bestått av halvstrukturerade intervjuer och kvalitativa enkäter. Intervjuerna utfördes med fyra ledare för fysiska aktiviteter med inslag av själslig hälsa (pilates, qigong, yoga) och enkäterna med 21 utövare. Som analysredskap har vi använts oss av John W. Fishers teori om själslig hälsa. I denna teori delar han in själslig hälsa i fyra områden; privat, kollektivt, miljö och övernaturligt. Resultat Vårt resultat visar att respondenterna anser att själslig hälsa till stor del utgörs av det privata och kollektiva området i Fishers teori. De andra två områdena; miljö och övernaturligt, berörs inte i samma utsträckning. Aktiviteterna i sig bidrar till själslig hälsa genom att de arbetar med helheten och att hjälper till att hitta närvaro och fokus. Respondenterna framhåller också att de känner sig mindre stressade i vardagen. Träning utförd i lugnt tempo var en av anledningarna som först lockat deltagarna till att börja med dessa aktiviteter. Efter hand har anledningarna utvecklats till möjligheten att fokusera och kontrollera sina tankar. Många av våra respondenter har haft en tidigare bakgrund som utbrända och har med dessa aktiviteter funnit en väg ut. Slutsats Inom dessa aktiviteter definieras själslig hälsa främst inom Fishers första och andra område. Att dessa aktiviteter har blivit en väg ut ur utbrändhet tror vi beror på att de utförs i ett lugnt och harmoniskt tempo och att de fokuserar på att kunna slappna av och falla till ro och att bli närvarande i sin egen kropp. Att arbeta med kroppen som verktyg, med hjälp av tex. andning, blick och fokus, är ett konkret sätt att uppnå själslig hälsa.

Cognitive impairment is prevalent among older adults population. It brings restriction to older adults’ lives and bring huge burden to the society. Mind-body exercise has characteristics from both physical exercise and intellectual experience. Moreover, it has potential cognitive benefits to reduce the incidence even reverse cognitive impairment. Using meta-analysis to analyze findings form published research on mind-body exercise, this study will explore whether practicing mind-body exercise is beneficial for the management of cognitive impairment.

This study evaluated the use of video self-evaluation and video feedback procedures to enhance the accuracy of yoga poses. In the self-evaluation intervention participants watched their behaviors via video and scored task analyses for feedback for each pose. In the video feedback intervention, the participants and the researcher together scored the task analyses for the behaviors along with practice during video recordings. The interventions were assessed in a multiple baseline across behaviors design. Results showed that both video self-evaluation increased the accuracy of all poses and video feedback further increased the accuracy on one pose for one participant

Background: A study of the impact of yoga and aerobic exercise and psychosis was conducted in 2012 by Lin et al., from The University of Hong Kong. The study indicated significant improvement in the aspects of physical fitness, cognitive functions, psychosocial and emotional functioning in patients with psychosis after a 12-week yoga or aerobic intervention program. Long-term effect of exercise intervention, however, had yet been determined. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the long-term effects of yoga and aerobic exercise on cognitive functioning and clinical symptoms in early psychosis. Patients who originally participated in Lin et al.’s 2012 study were recruited and re-assessed in this current 18-month follow-up study. Methods: Two intervention groups (yoga and aerobic exercise group) and one control group (wait-list control group) of a total 57 subjects from the initial study were recruited in this follow-up study. Cognitive functioning and clinical symptoms were assessed at three time points (T1:Baseline, T2:12-week, T3:18-month). Results: No significant changes or significant deterioration were found in cognitive functioning, clinical symptoms and depression between T2 (12-week) and T3 (18-month) in both intervention groups (yoga and aerobic group). Significant improvement of clinical symptoms was observed in wait-list control group at T3. Conclusions: Although there is no significant finding in this current study, it is still recommended that further study on the relationship between physical exercise intervention and psychosis should carried out in order to explore other adjunct, and especially low cost, treatment to antipsychotics in treating people with psychosis. / published_or_final_version / Psychological Medicine / Master / Master of Psychological Medicine

Modernity has seen the exchange of ideas about cognition between western science and eastern meditation traditions. In particular, western ways of thinking about the natural world have infiltrated Indian theories of yoga. This intersection of ideas in the twentieth-century has resulted in a problematic trend to theorize yogic phenomena, including meditation, in scientific terms. These translations converge on explicating yogic processes within a context of advancing knowledge about the brain. This translational approach to bringing etic and emic perspectives together in the same framework results in interpretations of meditation that succumb to problems cognitive science faces at a broader level in theorizing cognition and mind-body interrelations. In this study, I take a different approach to bringing emic and etic perspectives together by placing a phenomenologically interpreted emic account of absorption (the meditative shift in consciousness) into dialogue with current scientific understandings of three central mental processes of meditation. Specifically, I analyze ways of conceptualizing attention, memory, and emotion, and their underlying mechanisms as posited in yoga and science, focusing on the problem of how each system interprets the reality of absorption. This comparison suggests a basic similarity between the two systems: theorizing cognition and meditative absorption in terms of embodiment. This finding emphasizes the dual nature of embodiment as both experiential and physical. Finally, I consider this dialogue from an embodied mind perspective, an emerging way of thinking about and theorizing the mind-body in cognitive science, because this perspective challenges longstanding theoretical problems in western understandings of how the mind works. This analysis suggests that theorizing meditation in these dual terms of embodiment potentially solves the reductive challenges of dualistic and materialist philosophy that have plagued both religious and naturalistic attempts to explain absorption. This interdisciplinary dialogue provides a framework with which to think more critically about translational and cross-disciplinary efforts that have previously confused the goals of yoga and science and their respective foci on practice and mechanisms. I conclude that bridging ideas in this dialogical way reveals a complementary perspective between phenomenological and biological ways of understanding the mind that both hinge on embodied cognition. / text

The primary purpose of the present study was to determine the acute hemodynamic responses to twenty-three select yoga postures in advanced and novice yoga practitioners. Additionally, we sought to determine if trunk flexibility is related to arterial stiffness. Using a cross-sectional study design, 37 apparently healthy adults (26 females and 11 males; 22-71 years old) were divided into two groups according to level of yoga experience. Beat-to-beat measures of blood pressure, stroke volume, cardiac work-load, cardiac output, and total peripheral resistance were measured using a finger plethysmograph during the yoga routine. Baseline measures of trunk flexibility (sit-and-reach scores and inclinometer measurements) and arterial stiffness (carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity) were also compared. Yoga postures elicited significant increases in heart rate, blood pressure and cardiac output (P<0.05) for both groups. There was no difference in blood pressure responses between the two groups throughout the yoga testing session. Lumbar flexion, as measured by an inclinometer, was significantly (P<0.01) and inversely associated with cfPWV (r=-0.52). / text

No description available.

Abstract The core is the center of gravity in our body. Injuries and overload in the joints, is the most common reason for not be able to work in Sweden today. A god strength capacity in the core is important for secure and effective movements, as well for active athletes, as for non athletes. The increased number of employees, who report in sick today, has been correlated with psychological bad health. New methods to deal with mental and physical health problems among people can indicate to the fact that Yoga in the western world has increased its members, due its spiritual and physical recognition in favor of well being. The purpose with this study was to examine the effect of yoga practice on isometrics muscular strength endurance in the core, and if the mental and physical general health has been effected after 8 weeks of yoga classes twice a week. The method has a quantitative and qualitative approach. Fourteen health female subjects, ranging in age from 32 to 60 years old, were studied. The subjects were evaluated before and after the training program in three test positions for core isometric endurance. There was improvement for all the subjects, in all three tests positions together. The subject’s isometric endurance average improved with 29 %. All subjects reported improvement in physical and mental function after the yogic practices. These findings indicate that regular yoga practice can elicit improvements in isometric endurance in the core, and facilitate mental and physical well being for the subjects.

Recorded by Eugene Barsky, Physiotherapy Outreach Librarian, UBC / This is a Systematic Review Presentation titled - "The Effects of Yoga on People with Arthritis: A Systematic Review", created by Master of Physical Therapy Graduating Students, University of British Columbia - 2006, Presented on September 14-15, 2006 , Vancouver, BC, Canada

L’autor planteja una hipòtesi defensada d’una forma transdisciplinar (filosofia, antropologia, sociologia, mitologia, psicologia…). Ens parla, seguint l’estela de Max Scheler i de Max Weber, de la relació entre els quatre valors axiològics índics (els purusârthes) i l’estructura social. Es tracta del dharma (ètica), artha (economia), kâmâ (plaers) i moksha (alliberament espiritual) ben coneguts des de la dinastia Gupta (IV-VI dC.). Ells formen el nucli essencial i l’essencialisme de l’índia eterna –el sanâtana dharma-, que ha crescut a partir de les arrels del període Vèdic i del substrat anterior a la colonització dels aris. Estudiarem els intercanvis culturals entre l’Índia i Occident especialment durant els segles XIX i XX presentant les visions colonials i post colonials des de la mirada de ‘l’efecte pizza’. Presentarem les teories de Max Müller i el neo-hinduisme bastit per Swami Vivekananda, la Teosofia d’Helena Blavatsky i d’Annie Besant i la majestuosa figura d’en Mahâtma Gandhi. Aquest treball ens ajudarà a entendre millor l’Índia. El seu estudi ens ha de permetre confirmar la hipòtesi que l’esperit estructurador dels quatre valors subjauen darrere de les més profundes especificitats de les formes i estructures socials i històriques de la civilització hindú clàssica. / The author presents a hypothesis in which in a cross-disciplinary manner (philosophy, anthropology, sociology, mythology, psychology…), he speaks, following the approach of Max Scheler and Max Weber, about the relationship between the four major axiological values of the Hindu culture (the purusârthas) and the social structure. These values are dharma (ethics), artha (economy), kâmâ (pleasure) and moksha (spiritual freedom or liberation) well known from the Gupta period, from IV to VI CE. They are the core essence and essentialism of the eternal India –the sanâtana dharma-, growing from the roots of the Vedic period and from the early substrate before the Aryan colonization. We study too the cultural exchange between India and the West in XIX and XX centuries following the colonial and post colonial constructs from the point of view of the ‘pizza effect’. From the Max Müller’s theories to the neohinduism build by Swami Vivekânanda, the theosophy of Helena Blavatsky and Annie Besant and the majestic figure of Mahâtma Gandhi. This work will help us to have a better understanding of India. Their study must allow us to confirm the hypothesis that the structuring spirit of the four values lies behind the deepest singularities of the social and historical patterns and structures of the classical Hindu civilization.