7 mins of meditation reduces racial bias

Just seven minutes of a popular Buddhist meditation technique that is intended to create feelings of kindness may also reduce racial prejudice, according to new research.

The study by experts at the University of Sussex in UK found that seven minutes of Loving-kindness meditation, a Buddhist practice that promotes unconditional kindness towards oneself and others, is effective at reducing racial bias. “This indicates that some meditation techniques are about much more than feeling good, and might be an important tool for enhancing inter-group harmony,” said lead researcher Alexander Stell, a doctoral student in Psychology. LKM is known to engender happiness and kindness to oneself and others through repeating phrases such as “may you be happy and healthy” while visualising a particular person.

Some previous studies have shown that inducing happiness in people, for example by exposing them to upbeat music, can actually make them more likely to have prejudiced thoughts compared to those hearing sad music. “We wanted to see whether doing LKM towa-rds a member of another ethnic group would reduce the automatic preference people tend to show for their own ethnic group,” Stell said.