Comprehensive review on the benefits and physiological basis of yoga.

Yoga improves physical fitness, mental state, attention, processing speed, memory, cognitive functions, and executive functions. It reduces blood sugar, cholesterol, and hypertension in metabolic syndrome, slows age-related cardiovascular decline, improves cardiac performance, and enhances pulmonary function. Physiologic mechanisms include reduced stress and inflammation, increased gray matter volume, improved neural network flexibility, and reorganization of attentional networks. Yogic practices down-regulate the hypothalamopituitary adrenal axis and sympathetic nervous system, enhance the inhibitory mediator gamma-aminobutyric acid, and increase peripheral oxytocin, serotonin, and melatonin levels.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Yoga is widely considered as a method to improve psychological and physiological status of humans. A review is done about the benefits of yoga from the literature in modern medicine. The common benefits are in physical fitness, mental state, attention, processing speed, memory, cognitive functions and executive functions. Studies have demonstrated the benefits of yoga in metabolic syndrome with reduction of blood sugar, cholesterol, and hypertension. Yoga reduces the age-related deterioration in cardiovascular functions, improves cardiac performance, and makes pulmonary function better. The physiologic mechanisms of yoga are reduction of stress and inflammation, increased gray matter volume, improved neural network flexibility, and reorganization of attentional network. Several studies showed that yogic practices down-regulate the hypothalamopituitary adrenal axis and the sympathetic nervous system. Recent clinical in vivo experiments suggests that yoga enhances inhibitory mediator gamma-aminobutyric acid and enhances peripheral oxytocin levels. Serotonin and melatonin levels are also increased.