Stress reduction

            Human response to stressors in the environment produces emotional and physiological changes in individual human bodies in order to cope with that stress. This process most likely evolved to help us attend to immediate concerns in our environment to better our chances of survival, but in modern society, much of the stress felt is not beneficial in this way. Stress has been shown to have several negative effects on health, happiness, and overall wellbeing (see stress (biology)). One field of psychological inquiry into mindfulness is Mindfulness-based stress reduction or MBSR. Several studies have produced relevant findings:

• Jain and Shapiro (2007) conducted a study to show that mindfulness meditation may be specific in its ability to “reduce distractive and ruminative thoughts and behaviours”, which may provide a “unique mechanism by which mindfulness meditation reduces distress”.
• Arch (2006) found emotional regulation following focused breathing. A breathing group provided moderately positive responses to emotionally neutral visual slides, while "unfocused attention and worry" groups both responded significantly more negatively to neutral slides.
• Brown (2003) found declines in mood disturbance and stress following mindfulness interventions.
• Jha (2010)found that a sufficient meditation training practice may protect against functional impairments associated with high-stress contexts.
• Garland (2009) found declines in stress after mindfulness interventions, which are potentially due to the positive re-appraisals of what were at first appraised as stressors.