Podium Presentation 6th World Congress on Positive Psychology 2019

Social Psychiatry Enhancing Positive Mental Health among Adolescents: Role of Yoga (#380)

Debjani Mukherjee 1
  1. St. Thomas College, Bhilai, Bhilai, CHHATTISGARH, India

Yoga, an ancient Hindu practice, is considered a mind-body type of complementary and alternative medicine practice, recently documented by the Western-world also for its potential therapeutic effects. In this study, late-school and early-college going adolescent students who come for counseling and yoga are first clinically interviewed to diagnose if they had lingering traces of childhood trauma. They were categorized into 3 groups- 1)no trace of trauma, 2)mental trauma 3)physical and mental trauma. They were then Pre-tested on different dimensions of emotional maturity. Yogic sessions were attended by adolescents for minimum of 12 weeks with 4-5 sessions weekly. After this post-tests were done.   The results of the pre and post practice of yoga were correlated; regression analysis and qualitative analysis were done. This analysis showcased the huge impact of yogic interventions and the power of societal mingling emerged. What is to be underlined is the fact that yoga was found to be more benefiting the adolescents suffering from physical and mental trauma as compared to the others with high impact on emotional regression(T=6.463) and personality disintegration(T=6.006). This study further confirms the widespread usefulness of non clinical personnel in psychotherapeutic settings. Traditional Psychotherapies have to be broadened to accommodate oriental practices.