Doing Research: A Tutorial for Yoga Teachers

This article describes a Yoga teacher's experience in conceiving, designing, and implementing a research project. The study examined the effects of brief Yoga training on symptoms of psychological distress in individuals recovering from heart disease. A quasi-experimental design with pre-test, post-test, and non-equivalent groups was used. Seventeen cardiac rehabilitation outpatients (mean age: 65, age range:53-81) in three hospital programs received six weeks of Yoga training. The Yoga intervention consisted of modified Yoga postures practiced dynamically and integrated with conscious breathing. Each session ended with several minutes of regulated breathing practiced in a resting position. Emphasis throughout the six weeks was on cultivating a relatively long, smooth exhalation. Participants in the Yoga classes made significant improvements in their scores on Anxiety, Somatization, Tension,Depression, and the global measures, General Severity Index and Mood Disturbance. Somatization was the only variable in which the comparison group scored as high as or higher on the pretests than did the treatment group. The comparison group showed little change in Somatization at the end of the study, whereas the treatment group's differences were statistically significant (p <.01). Participants reported a number of benefits on an open-ended questionnaire at the end of the six weeks. At three-months follow-up, 12 of 15 respondents were maintaining at-home practice. The author discusses issues confronted by Yoga teachers attempting to measure and document the effects of their teaching. Consideration is given to other methods of inquiry appropriate for examining the processes as well as the outcomes of a Yoga intervention.