Consistency, diversity key to digital meditation success

A global study analysing more than 280,000 digital meditation sessions has found the practice leads to significant improvements in mood, regardless of the length of a session.

The University of Adelaide-led study, which used de-identified data provided by US-based meditation app Insight Timer, found consistent practice had a greater influence on the effectiveness of meditation for a practitioner.

“A lot of people feel like they need to meditate every day for long periods of time to realise any benefit, and then become disheartened when they find this unsustainable,” said corresponding author Dr Micah Cearns, who is a data scientist with Insight Timer and a Research Fellow in the University of Adelaide’s Discipline of Psychiatry.

“We found that practice consistency was the most important predictor of positive outcome change. Specifically, keeping up a regular practice but taking occasional rest days when required.”

As meditators gained experience, longer sessions led to increased mood improvements.

“We can think of the relationship between mood benefits and length of a session as one that is graded and changes as users become more experienced through completing more sessions,” said Dr Cearns.

Both interoceptive (internally focussed) and exteroceptive (externally focussed) sessions led to improvements; however, meditators who practiced a mix of both were the most likely to maintain a meditation practice long-term.

There were more than 10,500 participants in the study, from 103 countries. The data was collected with informed consent over 14 months and measured Insight Timer users’ mood, mood stability, and recover time from a drop in mood.

Users were prompted in-app to complete a mood check-in each time they performed a digital meditation – a data-collection method known as ecological momentary assessment.

“We found that practice consistency was the most important predictor of positive outcome change. Specifically, keeping up a regular practice but taking occasional rest days when required.”Dr Micah Cearns from the University of Adelaide’s Discipline of Psychiatry

“This technique affords data collection with close proximity to day-to-day events and minimises the chances of recall biases that can be prevalent in traditional assessment techniques. It also maximises the real-world validity of the findings,” said Dr Cearns.

Working with an industry partner like Insight Timer significantly benefitted the scale of this study.

“Many tech companies generate massive amounts of data related to health and wellbeing within the natural context of how consumers complete their everyday self-care routines,” he said.

“This is really where the university/tech relationship thrives – researchers can answer questions related to health, tech companies receive insights into their products, while the public benefits from new knowledge going into the public domain.”

The global meditation market is a multi-billion-dollar industry, with app stores awash with platforms offering guided meditations and other wellbeing activities.

While the data collected from this study was sourced from just one app, Dr Cearns said the findings are likely applicable to other apps with a similarly broad range of meditation types.

Co-author and Head of the University of Adelaide’s Discipline of Psychiatry, Associate Professor Scott Clark, agrees.

“The study provides definitive evidence for the effectiveness of mindfulness apps and defines the best way to use them,” said Associate Professor Clark.

The study was published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research.