Publication:

Effect of yogic relaxation technique on auditory and visual reaction times

Background Human beings receive various types of stimuli in day to day life and respond to them accordingly. The time taken to receive a stimulus, it's processing and giving a response is different for every individual at minute level, in milliseconds. This time interval is called reaction time. Various yogic practices are found to influence the Reaction Time of individuals. Aim of the work was to evaluate the immediate effect of deep relaxation technique on auditory and visual reaction time.

Methods Auditory and visual reaction times have been measured using simple reaction time tasks in Inquisit software (version 4.0.10.0). 115 healthy yoga students from SVYASA Yoga university, between the age group of 20 to 50 years were taken for the study. Pre and post measurements of auditory reaction time and visual reaction time was done.10 minutes of pre-recorded DRT was given as intervention and immediately after that reaction times were measured.

Results There was a significant decline in the ART and VRT observed in the Post DRT condition. Statistical analysis was carried out using JASP software.

Conclusions The significant decrease in Auditory and Visual Reaction Time shows that DRT helps to increase the awareness and attention of individuals.