Mind-Body Practices and the Self: Yoga and Meditation Do Not Quiet the Ego but Instead Boost Self-Enhancement.
Mind-body practices enjoy immense public and scientific interest. Yoga and meditation are highly popular. Purportedly, they foster well-being by curtailing self-enhancement bias. However, this "ego-quieting" effect contradicts an apparent psychological universal, the self-centrality principle. According to this principle, practicing any skill renders that skill self-central, and self-centrality breeds self-enhancement bias. We examined those opposing predictions in the first tests of mind-body practices' self-enhancement effects. In Experiment 1, we followed 93 yoga students over 15 weeks, assessing self-centrality and self-enhancement bias after yoga practice (yoga condition, n = 246) and without practice (control condition, n = 231). In Experiment 2, we followed 162 meditators over 4 weeks (meditation condition: n = 246; control condition: n = 245). Self-enhancement bias was higher in the yoga (Experiment 1) and meditation (Experiment 2) conditions, and those effects were mediated by greater self-centrality. Additionally, greater self-enhancement bias mediated mind-body practices' well-being benefits. Evidently, neither yoga nor meditation fully quiet the ego; to the contrary, they boost self-enhancement.
['Gebauer|Jochen E|JE|', 'Nehrlich|Andreas D|AD|', 'Stahlberg|Dagmar|D|', 'Sedikides|Constantine|C|', 'Hackenschmidt|Anke|A|', 'Schick|Doreen|D|', 'Stegmaier|Clara A|CA|', 'Windfelder|Cara C|CC|', 'Bruk|Anna|A|', 'Mander|Johannes|J|']
D000328:Adult D004644:Emotions D005260:Female D005858:Germany D006801:Humans D008297:Male D019122:Meditation D008875:Middle Aged D064866:Mindfulness D000068356:Self-Control D013315:Stress, Psychological D015013:Yoga
yoga meditation self-enhancement self-centrality mindfulness open data