Evidence That a Brief Meditation Exercise Can Reduce Prejudice Toward Homeless People
Stefania Parks, Michèle D. Birtel, Richard John Crisp
Social Psychology October 10, 2014 DOI: 10.1027/1864-9335/a000212 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Experimental intervention study (brief single-session meditation) Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Intervention | Loving-kindness meditation |
| Duration | Single, brief intervention |
| Topics | Meditation |
| Citations | 56 |
| Key findings | Participants who completed a brief loving-kindness meditation focused on a stranger or a homeless person reported reduced intergroup anxiety, more positive explicit attitudes, and enhanced future contact intentions. The authors argue that combining psychotherapy and intergroup-relations approaches could be useful for designing new anti-prejudice interventions. |
Abstract
Recent research has shown that integrating social and clinical psychological perspectives can be effective when designing prejudice-interventions, with psychotherapeutic techniques successful at tackling anxiety in intergroup contexts. This research tests whether a single, brief loving-kindness meditation intervention, without containing any reference to the intergroup context, could reduce prejudice. This exercise was selected for its proven positive effects on mental and physical health. We observed that participants who took part in two variations of this meditation exercise (one involving a stranger, the other a homeless person) reported reduced intergroup anxiety, as well as more positive explicit attitudes, and enhanced future contact intentions. We conclude that combining approaches in intergroup relations and psychotherapy could be beneficial to design new interventions to combat prejudice and discrimination.
Comparable studies
Other experimental studies on meditation, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| The benefits of being present: Mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being. Cancer patients (clinical intervention study) | 2003 | Mixed methods: scale development, correlational, quasi-experimental, laboratory, experience-sampling, and clinical intervention study | |
| Loving-kindness meditation increases social connectedness. | 2008 | Controlled laboratory experiment | |
| Mindfulness and mind-wandering: Finding convergence through opposing constructs. | 2012 | Two studies: correlational study and experimental study | |
| Mental Training Enhances Attentional Stability: Neural and Behavioral Evidence | 2009 | Experimental study | |
| Mindfulness meditation and substance use in an incarcerated population. Incarcerated population | 2006 | Quasi-experimental with treatment-as-usual control condition |
Citations in the library
Cited by 8
- The effect of loving-kindness meditation on positive emotions: a meta-analytic review Frontiers in Psychology November 3, 2015
- A kind mind: effects of compassion-based meditation on prosocial intergroup outcomes in a South African pilot sample. Frontiers in Psychology 2025
- Meditation, free-will beliefs, and sentencing attitudes: an exploratory pilot study in India Frontiers in Psychology August 10, 2026
- Meditation, Not Information? A Survey Experiment Probing the Effects of Meditation Practice on Affective Polarization and Pro-Environmentalism Mindfulness February 1, 2025
- Loving-kindness and compassion meditations in the workplace: A meta-analysis and future prospects. Stress and Health February 1, 2024
and 3 more in the library
Cites 11
- Mindfulness training as a clinical intervention: A conceptual and empirical review. Clinical Psychology Science and Practice 2003
- How Does Mindfulness Meditation Work? Proposing Mechanisms of Action From a Conceptual and Neural Perspective Perspectives on Psychological Science October 14, 2011
- Open hearts build lives: Positive emotions, induced through loving-kindness meditation, build consequential personal resources. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology October 27, 2008
- Loving-kindness and compassion meditation: potential for psychological interventions. Clinical Psychology Review July 26, 2011
- Regulation of the Neural Circuitry of Emotion by Compassion Meditation: Effects of Meditative Expertise PLoS One March 25, 2008
and 6 more in the library