Transcendental Meditation for Women Affected by Domestic Violence: A Pilot Randomised, Controlled Trial

Transcendental Meditation improved quality of life, mood, and perceived stress more than group support for female survivors of domestic violence in a 16-week pilot randomized controlled trial. Forty-two women from metropolitan Adelaide were assigned to either Transcendental Meditation or group support. The meditation group showed significantly greater gains in Australian Quality of Life scores and greater reductions in depression, anxiety, and stress severity. No significant difference was found between groups for PTSD symptom severity. Transcendental Meditation may offer an effective alternative to group support for this population.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Domestic and family violence is a major public health issue impacting one in three women worldwide. The implications of such violence are considerable. Transcendental Meditation® (TM) represents a promising treatment option for women impacted by domestic violence given its demonstrable effects on mental and trauma-related symptoms. This study set out to compare the effectiveness of TM to group support, on quality of life, perceived stress and mood in female survivors of domestic violence. This 16-week pilot randomised controlled trial recruited women from metropolitan Adelaide, who survived any type of domestic violence in their lifetime. Outcomes included health-related quality of life, severity of depression, anxiety and perceived stress, symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, and subjective experience. Data were analysed by intention-to-treat using linear mixed-effects models. Forty-two women were randomly assigned to the TM (n = 21) and support (n = 21) groups. Adjusting for random effects, TM was shown to be significantly more effective than support at improving Australian Quality of Life (AQoL-8D) utility scores (p = .011), and Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21) severity scores for depression (p = .029), anxiety (p = .017) and stress (p = .021) over the 16 weeks. There was no statistically significant time-group interaction effect for PTSD Checklist for DSM-5 (PCL-5) total symptom severity scores. TM is shown to have promising effects on quality of life, perceived stress and mood among women exposed to domestic violence, suggesting that it may represent an effective alternative to group support. ACTRN12620000467932 (09/04/2020).