International Journal of Adolescence and Youth
January 29, 2026
Lee Fergusson, Javier Ortiz Cabrejos, Anna Bonshek
Self-esteem and a strong sense of self predict health and longevity. Transcendental Meditation develops both. This mixed methods study in Peru explored its impact on self-esteem in primary school students. After three months of meditation practice, the proportion of students rated as having 'high' self-esteem increased from 38% to 54%, a 43% increase. Self-reported experiences were triangulated, suggesting an impact on sense of self.
Current Issues in Education
March 27, 2026
Lee Fergusson, Javier Ortiz Cabrejos, Anna Bonshek
Higher levels of health, school performance, and personal wellbeing are associated with regularity of Transcendental Meditation practice among indigenous school children and adolescents in Peru. A cross-sectional study of 248 students at three new schools in Cusco, Huancayo, and Acomayo used multiple linear regression to examine possible causal links between meditation regularity and physical health, cognitive health, emotional health, school performance, and personal wellbeing. Preliminary results mostly support and strengthen earlier findings, now including personal wellbeing. The authors conclude that controlled, longitudinal research of meditation, health, and wellbeing may be warranted in Peruvian primary and secondary schools.
January 1, 2026
Lee Fergusson, Javier Ortiz Cabrejos, Anna Bonshek
This book argues that Peru's remarkable socio-economic recovery after 1995, often called the 'Peruvian miracle', originated from a 1983 visit by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and the subsequent teaching of Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi programs. The book presents research across four parts: pre-pandemic studies with students at high altitudes and in multiple schools; peri-pandemic research comparing meditating students during COVID-19 home isolation to a pre-pandemic comparison group; post-pandemic research including a quasi-experimental study with 402 indigenous children showing increased personal wellbeing after practicing Transcendental Meditation; and sociological research linking large-scale group practice of these programs to the Maharishi Effect, which the authors claim contributed to Peru's transformation.
Journal of Latinos & Education
February 2, 2025
Lee Fergusson, Javier Ortiz Cabrejos, Anna Bonshek
A proto-theoretical model of stress, psychophysiology, and coping explains adverse impacts on children in home isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic, such as increased loneliness, anxiety, depression, and risk of psychiatric illness. In a study of 54 Aymara and Quechua children at a school in Puno, Peru, 98% reported that Transcendental Meditation beneficially affected their health and academic achievement. On a 1–10 scale, average ratings were 7.55 for physical health, 7 for cognitive health, 7.48 for emotional health, and 7.85 for academic achievement. Similar ratings were given for coping, learning, anxiety, depression, and optimism.
World Journal of Social Science
November 13, 2023
Lee Fergusson, Javier Ortiz Cabrejos, Anna Bonshek
More than 60 well-controlled studies since 1974 suggest a causal link between the number of people practicing the Transcendental Meditation technique and societal order, harmony, and prosperity, mediated by brainwave coherence measured via EEG and fMRI. This preliminary descriptive study examines whether such an effect occurred in Perú, where over 53,600 children and adolescents have practiced Transcendental Meditation in schools since 1996. Comparing data from 1980 to 2020 on 20 variables—including poverty, health, education, and economic indicators—the authors find that the 26-year Impact Assessment Period (1995–2020) shows associations between group meditation practice and improved living standards compared to the Baseline Period (1980–1994). Perú now ranks among the most prosperous Latin American nations and the third most optimistic population globally.
Tapuya
March 15, 2022
Lee Fergusson, Javier Ortiz Cabrejos, Anna Bonshek
A group of 54 indigenous students in Puno, Peru, who practiced Transcendental Meditation as part of their school routine, reported favorable physical, cognitive, and emotional health and school performance during home isolation in the COVID-19 pandemic. Their results were contrasted with a comparison group of 53 meditating students who reported their health and learning before the pandemic. The study examined group meditation practiced at the same time and place daily at school, and during online sessions at the same time but in different locations. Both approaches to group meditation were associated with positive outcomes for health and school performance.
Journal of Latinos & Education
March 19, 2021
Lee Fergusson, Javier Ortiz Cabrejos, Anna Bonshek
Practicing the Transcendental Meditation technique in schools and universities has been studied for 50 years and appears to support student development and learning, but its introduction in Latin America is recent and unstudied. This research in Puno, Perú used semi-structured interviews with parents and teachers to understand the consequences of the practice on Aymara school children's personal, academic, and social lives. Frequency and saliency analysis of the interviews revealed both confirmatory and unique outcomes, which are discussed alongside international empirical findings to create a learned history of the practice in Perú.
Journal of Maharishi Vedic Research Institute
September 1, 2020
Geoffrey A. Wells, Lee Fergusson, Anna Bonshek
Regular practice of the Transcendental Meditation technique, performed twice daily, is said to systematically lead to a predictable sequence of higher states of consciousness: Cosmic Consciousness, Refined Cosmic Consciousness or God Consciousness, and Unity Consciousness. The last represents the full development of human potential. This claim, attributed to Maharishi, is presented as central to understanding individual and collective human life.
Journal of Maharishi Vedic Research Institute
September 1, 2020
Geoffrey A. Wells, Lee Fergusson, Anna Bonshek
This work describes the sixth and seventh states of consciousness according to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, which represent the pinnacle of human development. Maharishi taught that these states are accessible to anyone through his simple technologies of consciousness. His published writings on these higher states are fewer than those on Transcendental Consciousness and Cosmic Consciousness, because systematic understanding has been given out as experiences of them became more common. The descriptions are concentrated and rich, providing profound insights. Such accounts of the highest levels of human life are extraordinarily rare in history, and Maharishi describes the experiences with clarity, precision, and completeness.
Journal of Maharishi Vedic Research Institute
September 1, 2020
Geoffrey A. Wells, Lee Fergusson, Anna Bonshek
The chapter examines how action, impression, and desire relate to living Cosmic Consciousness, shedding light on ignorance and enlightenment and how ignorance transforms into enlightenment. These themes were central to Maharishi's early teaching and reappear in the advanced concept of Pragya-aparadha, 'the mistake of the intellect.'