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      Yoga for Children and Young People’s Mental Health and Well-Being: Research Review and Reflections on the Mental Health Potentials of Yoga

      review-article
      1 , * , 2
      Frontiers in Psychiatry
      Frontiers Media S.A.
      children, young people, mental health, well-being, yoga

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          Abstract

          This article discusses yoga as a potential tool for children to deal with stress and regulate themselves. Yoga provides training of mind and body to bring emotional balance. We argue that children and young people need such tools to listen inward to their bodies, feelings, and ideas. Yoga may assist them in developing in sound ways, to strengthen themselves, and be contributing social beings. First, we address how children and young people in today’s world face numerous expectations and constant stimulation through the Internet and other media and communication technologies. One reason why children experience stress and mental health challenges is that globalization exposes the youth all over the world to various new demands, standards, and options. There is also increased pressure to succeed in school, partly due to increased competition but also a diverse range of options available for young people in contemporary times than in the past. Our argument also partially rests on the fact that modern society offers plenty of distractions and unwelcome attractions, especially linked to new media technologies. The dominant presence of multimedia devices and the time spent on them by children are clear indicators of the shift in lifestyles and priorities of our new generation. While these media technologies are valuable resources in children and young people’s lives for communication, learning, and entertainment, they also result in constant competition for youngster’s attention. A main concept in our article is that yoga may help children and young people cope with stress and thus, contribute positively to balance in life, well-being, and mental health. We present research literature suggesting that yoga improves children’s physical and mental well-being. Similarly, yoga in schools helps students improve resilience, mood, and self-regulation skills pertaining to emotions and stress.

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          Most cited references13

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          The health benefits of yoga and exercise: a review of comparison studies.

          Exercise is considered an acceptable method for improving and maintaining physical and emotional health. A growing body of evidence supports the belief that yoga benefits physical and mental health via down-regulation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis and the sympathetic nervous system (SNS). The purpose of this article is to provide a scholarly review of the literature regarding research studies comparing the effects of yoga and exercise on a variety of health outcomes and health conditions. Using PubMed((R)) and the key word "yoga," a comprehensive search of the research literature from core scientific and nursing journals yielded 81 studies that met inclusion criteria. These studies subsequently were classified as uncontrolled (n = 30), wait list controlled (n = 16), or comparison (n = 35). The most common comparison intervention (n = 10) involved exercise. These studies were included in this review. In the studies reviewed, yoga interventions appeared to be equal or superior to exercise in nearly every outcome measured except those involving physical fitness. The studies comparing the effects of yoga and exercise seem to indicate that, in both healthy and diseased populations, yoga may be as effective as or better than exercise at improving a variety of health-related outcome measures. Future clinical trials are needed to examine the distinctions between exercise and yoga, particularly how the two modalities may differ in their effects on the SNS/HPA axis. Additional studies using rigorous methodologies are needed to examine the health benefits of the various types of yoga.
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            Effects of Yoga on Mental and Physical Health: A Short Summary of Reviews

            This report summarizes the current evidence on the effects of yoga interventions on various components of mental and physical health, by focussing on the evidence described in review articles. Collectively, these reviews suggest a number of areas where yoga may well be beneficial, but more research is required for virtually all of them to firmly establish such benefits. The heterogeneity among interventions and conditions studied has hampered the use of meta-analysis as an appropriate tool for summarizing the current literature. Nevertheless, there are some meta-analyses which indicate beneficial effects of yoga interventions, and there are several randomized clinical trials (RCT's) of relatively high quality indicating beneficial effects of yoga for pain-associated disability and mental health. Yoga may well be effective as a supportive adjunct to mitigate some medical conditions, but not yet a proven stand-alone, curative treatment. Larger-scale and more rigorous research with higher methodological quality and adequate control interventions is highly encouraged because yoga may have potential to be implemented as a beneficial supportive/adjunct treatment that is relatively cost-effective, may be practiced at least in part as a self-care behavioral treatment, provides a life-long behavioural skill, enhances self-efficacy and self-confidence and is often associated with additional positive side effects.
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              Yoga on Our Minds: A Systematic Review of Yoga for Neuropsychiatric Disorders

              Background: The demand for clinically efficacious, safe, patient acceptable, and cost-effective forms of treatment for mental illness is growing. Several studies have demonstrated benefit from yoga in specific psychiatric symptoms and a general sense of well-being. Objective: To systematically examine the evidence for efficacy of yoga in the treatment of selected major psychiatric disorders. Methods: Electronic searches of The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials and the standard bibliographic databases, MEDLINE, EMBASE, and PsycINFO, were performed through April 2011 and an updated in June 2011 using the keywords yoga AND psychiatry OR depression OR anxiety OR schizophrenia OR cognition OR memory OR attention AND randomized controlled trial (RCT). Studies with yoga as the independent variable and one of the above mentioned terms as the dependent variable were included and exclusion criteria were applied. Results: The search yielded a total of 124 trials, of which 16 met rigorous criteria for the final review. Grade B evidence supporting a potential acute benefit for yoga exists in depression (four RCTs), as an adjunct to pharmacotherapy in schizophrenia (three RCTs), in children with ADHD (two RCTs), and Grade C evidence in sleep complaints (three RCTs). RCTs in cognitive disorders and eating disorders yielded conflicting results. No studies looked at primary prevention, relapse prevention, or comparative effectiveness versus pharmacotherapy. Conclusion: There is emerging evidence from randomized trials to support popular beliefs about yoga for depression, sleep disorders, and as an augmentation therapy. Limitations of literature include inability to do double-blind studies, multiplicity of comparisons within small studies, and lack of replication. Biomarker and neuroimaging studies, those comparing yoga with standard pharmaco- and psychotherapies, and studies of long-term efficacy are needed to fully translate the promise of yoga for enhancing mental health.
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Journal
                Front Psychiatry
                Front Psychiatry
                Front. Psychiatry
                Frontiers in Psychiatry
                Frontiers Media S.A.
                1664-0640
                22 January 2014
                02 April 2014
                2014
                : 5
                : 35
                Affiliations
                [1] 1Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, NTNU , Trondheim, Norway
                [2] 2New School University , New York, USA
                Author notes

                Edited by: Shirley Telles, Patanjali Research Foundation, India

                Reviewed by: Tariq Munshi, Queen’s University, Canada; Casimiro Cabrera Abreu, Department of Psychiatry, Queen’s University and Providence Care, Canada

                *Correspondence: Ingunn Hagen, Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, NTNU, 7491 Trondheim, Norway e-mail: ingunn.hagen@ 123456svt.ntnu.no

                This article was submitted to Affective Disorders and Psychosomatic Research, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry.

                Article
                10.3389/fpsyt.2014.00035
                3980104
                24765080
                b94c85d3-d190-48d0-aef5-bfbadadf6596
                Copyright © 2014 Hagen and Nayar.

                This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

                History
                : 19 December 2013
                : 18 March 2014
                Page count
                Figures: 1, Tables: 0, Equations: 0, References: 47, Pages: 6, Words: 5535
                Categories
                Psychiatry
                Review Article

                Clinical Psychology & Psychiatry
                children,young people,mental health,well-being,yoga
                Clinical Psychology & Psychiatry
                children, young people, mental health, well-being, yoga

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