Religion in the News

Among other changes, both groups showed decreased activity in the parts of the brain that have to do with sense of self and spatial orientation _ which suggests the description of oneness with God, of transcendence sometimes experienced in meditation or prayer.

Prayer and meditation also increase levels of dopamine, often referred to as the brain's pleasure hormone.

"The mind and the body are the flip side of the same coin," said Dr. Daniel Monti, head of Thomas Jefferson University Hospital's integrated medicine center. "Now we know some of the mechanisms by which that occurs, and it's becoming better and better understood."

The integrated medicine center teaches patients with cancer, chronic pain and other ailments to work things like meditation and proper diet into their conventional therapy, Monti said. Such thinking seemed "fringy" to many people a decade ago, but it is becoming widely accepted by the medical community and patients, he said.

"Now there's the recognition that a truly effective treatment plan is not just giving a pill," he said. "We need to look at how to help a person adjust to a different lifestyle in addition to taking a pill."

Not many imaging studies have yet been done that look at changes in the brain's blood flow because technology has only within the past decade become sophisticated enough to study the brain in this way, Newberg said. An increase in blood flow to certain parts of the brain means increased activity in those areas.

Newberg is currently studying how the brains of novice yoga practitioners change as they become more adept, and whether meditation can improve cognitive impairment in people with mild dementia or early Alzheimer's disease.

"The sky's the limit as far as the things we can study," he said.

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On the Net:

Center for Spirituality and the Mind: http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/radiology/CSM/