Psychological Reports
October 1, 1994
J J Janowiak, R Hackman
This paper concerns the efficacy of meditation and relaxation in promoting self-actualization and changes in self-reported stress among 62 college students. Two groups were given mantra meditation and a yogic relaxation technique referred to as Shavasana. Pre- and posttest measures were taken on the Personal Orientation Inventory and the Behavioral Relaxation Scale. Both groups showed...
Psychological Reports
April 1, 1992
Deirdre Barrett, Michael Loeffler
Dreams of 20 college women classified as depressed by scores on the Beck Depression Inventory were compared with those of 21 nondepressed college women. The depressed group recalled fewer dreams, had significantly shorter dream length, and displayed less anger in their dreams. They also had fewer characters in their dreams and especially fewer strangers.
Psychological Reports
October 1, 1989
Ellen H. Yeagle, Gayle Privette, Frances Y. Dunham
Descriptions of peak experiences collected from 29 exhibiting artists were compared with parallel data from a comparison group of 123 men and women enrolled in university courses in social sciences. Each person narratively described a personal incident of highest happiness, then rated a series of descriptions on Likert-type scales. A multivariate analysis of variance indicated no significant...
Psychological Reports
April 1, 1987
Jerome J. Tobacyk, Thomas E. Mitchell
The Narcissistic Personality Inventory and the Paranormal Belief Scale were given to 383 college students. As hypothesized, significant but small direct correlations were obtained between narcissism and belief in Psi and in Precognition. When the sample was divided into those 56 who reported out-of-body experiences and 327 nonreporters, an interaction emerged. Among the former, narcissism...
Psychological Reports
April 1, 1986
Gayle Privette, David Sherry
The Questionnaire: Peak Performance and Peak Experience is based on both research and theoretical content found through a comparative analysis of literature germane to peak performance, peak experience, and flow. The Dale-Chall Readability Formula indicated that readability of the questionnaire is at the upper limits of the 9th and 10th grades. A Pearson product-moment correlation, based on 33...
Psychological Reports
December 1, 1985
Ronald Gordon
15 citations
A brief inventory of characteristics of “peak communication experiences” was developed from Maslow's model of the generalized peak experience. Data from 74 subjects were submitted to principal components analysis with varimax rotation, yielding six factors which accounted for 66.1% of the total variance, as follows: Loving Acceptance (25.9%), Openminded Insight (10.2%), Spontaneity (9.2%),...
Psychological Reports
October 1, 1985
Gayle Privette
5 citations
Two experiential phenomena, performance and feeling, were defined operationally by a model that indicated gradients and possible interrelations between phenomena (Privette, 1985). Six events characterize major gradients and interrelations: peak performance, functioning at one's best; peak experience, highest happiness; flow, intrinsic reward, identified as a sport or game; an average event,...
Psychological Reports
February 1, 1985
Gayle Privette
15 citations
Experience, an internal state or process, has salience, as does behavior, as a basic data category of personality. Two key experiential phenomena, which exemplify experience as a data category, were identified and operationally defined by a model. Peak experience and peak performance were taken to be prototypes of feeling and performance. Possible relations between these phenomena and...
Psychological Reports
February 1, 1984
David Trueman
The present study was designed to assess whether individuals reporting experiences of depersonalization or derealization experience higher levels of anxiety than those subjects not reporting these experiences. 221 undergraduates volunteered to complete questionnaires on depersonalization and derealization and the IPAT Anxiety Scale. Analysis indicated that subjects experiencing...
Psychological Reports
December 1, 1983
Daniel J. Kindlon
Undergraduate volunteers (16 men, 19 women) were randomly assigned to either a meditation or a control condition balanced for expectancy to compare the function of these treatments in the alleviation of test anxiety. Self-report, performance, and physiological indices were assessed as moderated by gender, Scholastic Aptitude Test score, frequency of practice, repression, and expectancy of...
Psychological Reports
February 1, 1983
Phillip T. Griffin, Richard E. Garey, George C. Daul et al.
The medical records of 153 psychiatric admissions who were determined to be Phencyclidine toxic were analyzed for the presence of various categories of psychiatric symptoms. Aggression was observed during the hospital stay by 58% of the patients followed closely by bizarre behavior (55%) and anxiety (53%). 116 males did not differ from 37 females in observed symptoms but 112 blacks showed more...
Psychological Reports
December 1, 1982
Elaine N. Aron, Arthur Aron
17 married women who had received instruction in the Transcendental Meditation program were compared to 17 controls (matched for length of marriage, age, and neighborhood) on Locke's Marital Adjustment Inventory. Interviewees did not know the study was related to meditation or that they were contacted because they were meditators. Subjects in the Transcendental Meditation group showed...
Psychological Reports
December 1, 1981
Stephen M. Rivers, Nicholas P. Spaños
12 citations
147 students were assessed on absorption, hypnotic susceptibility, and three measures of “psychological well-being” (self-esteem, depressive affect, psychosomatic symptoms) and were then invited to participate without cost in a program to learn meditation. Those completing the four-session training program were followed for 5 mo. by phone and mail. Analysis indicated that (a) meditating...
Psychological Reports
December 1, 1980
Albert R. Gilgen, Jae H. Cho, Robert Stensrud
On the basis of performance on the East-West Questionnaire, 69 members of the Association for Transpersonal Psychology were Eastern in their thinking in that they tended to believe in the essential unity of reality and the contention that our society overemphasizes science, technology, rationality, and competition. At the same time they favored a democratic form of government, a free-enterprise...
Psychological Reports
April 1, 1977
Thomas K. Akers, Don M Tucker, Randy S. Roth et al.
15 seminary students who regularly practiced a form of Christian meditation were given the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI). Electroencephalographic (EEG) signals were recorded and analyzed for percent time alpha during performance of a series of mental arithmetic tasks and also during a period of meditation. Higher scores on the Hypochondriasis scale of the MMPI were...
Psychological Reports
December 1, 1976
Ralph W. Hood
The relationship between reported mystical experience and present and anticipated patterns of church participation was investigated in an initial sample of 324 persons. A scale to measure reported mystical experience that allowed for a distinction between the report of mystical experience (Factor I) and its religious interpretation (Factor II) was utilized. Each factor differentially related to...
Psychological Reports
October 1, 1976
Arnold A. Lazarus
87 citations
Like many procedures, Transcendental Meditation (TM) proves extremely effective when applied to properly selected cases by informed practitioners. It is not a panacea. In fact, when used indiscriminately, there are clinical indications that the procedure can precipitate serious psychiatric problems such as depression, agitation, and even schizophrenic decompensation.
Psychological Reports
December 1, 1971
C. Brooks Brenneis
Judges with diverse professional training and experience were asked to discriminate the dreams of hospitalized schizophrenics from those of hospitalized nonschizophrenics, a task which proved to be subjectively and objectively extraordinarily difficult. Performing barely above chance expectation as a group, judges tended to be misled by an invalid assumption that material depicting loss of body...
Psychological Reports
October 1, 1969
David Lester
15 citations
In a sample of 170 college students, no association was found between the frequency of nightmare occurrences and the fear of death or dying. The degree to which nightmares were remembered was also not associated with the fear of death.
Psychological Reports
June 1, 1969
Allan E. Edwards, Marshall H. Bloom, Sidney Cohen
30 heavy psychedelic users were compared with 30 matched controls using the Rosenzweig and Comrey tests. The drug-dependent group demonstrated aberrant personality traits only with respect to increased Hostility. It appears that this propensity is unrelated to degree of drug dependency and may reflect a predisposing state. People who have difficulty handling their aggressive feelings may tend...
Psychological Reports
February 1, 1969
C. A. Haertzen
Contrast effects in an experiment involving no-drug, placebo, and seven drugs were postulated on the basis of Helson's adaptation level theory. For 250 male opiate addicts, it was expected and found that general subjective experiences peculiar to drugs were smaller for no-drug or placebo conditions when these conditions were administered after rather than before potent drugs such as morphine or...
Psychological Reports
June 1, 1968
Ronald N. Bone, Faith Corlett
Frequency of dream recall ( f DR ) correlated with a creativity score on the Remote Associates Test (RAT). This correlation was lowered by anxiety which correlated positively with f DR but negatively with the RAT scores. Control for the biasing effect of anxiety was accomplished by a partial correlation which increased the f DR -RAT correlation.
Psychological Reports
August 1, 1966
Willis W. Harman, Robert McKim, Robert E. Mogar et al.
140 citations
Based on the frequently reported similarities between creative and psychedelic (drug-induced, consciousness-expansion) experiences, a preliminary study was conducted to explore the effects of psychedelic agents (LSD-25, mescaline) on creative problem-solving ability. Twenty-seven professionally employed males were given a single psychedelic experience in 1 of 7 small groups ( ns = 3 or 4)...
Psychological Reports
February 1, 1964
Charles Savage, Ethel Savage, James Fadiman et al.
25 citations
Preliminary results of a study of psychedelic therapy are reported. Patients receive LSD and mescaline in a supportive setting following intensive preparation. Subjective questionnaire data from 113 patients reveal a high frequency of claimed benefit, low frequency of negative reaction, and a high relation between claimed benefit and reported “greater awareness of ultimate reality” through the...
Psychological Reports
October 1, 1963
Gilbert Honigfeld
7 citations
Cloze analysis was used to assess the “understandability” of the spontaneous speech of a normal S who had received 9 mg. of psilocybin. This drug seemed to exert an enhancing effect within the first 1½ hr., followed quickly by a deterioration in the quality of verbal communication for about the next 2 hr.