A new randomized controlled trial published in the journal Education found that ninth-graders that practiced the transcendental meditation (TM) technique had significant improvements in emotional stress symptoms, quality of sleep and academic achievement when compared to students that spent the same time in silent reading. This was the first randomized control trial to investigate the effects of a meditation-based school program on standardized tests.

These findings are helpful for teens that, as reported in the online science news service EurekAlert!, “report stress well above what they believe to be healthy. Thirty-one percent of teens report feeling overwhelmed and 36 percent report feeling fatigued as a result of stress. Over a third of teens report that their stress level has increased in the past year, while around half of teens don't feel they are doing enough to manage their stress. This increased stress is linked to poor academics, as well as a number of other measures, including lower attendance, and unhealthy behaviors around sleep, eating and substance use.”

The new research corroborates past findings on TM and stress, emotional health, academic performance and social behavior and concludes that learning the transcendental meditation technique positively affects quality of life in all these categories.