Effectiveness of Nadi Shodhana Pranayama in Improving the Well-Being of Adolescent Girls

Abstract

The adolescent period is a distinctive stage of human development. Practicing Nadi Shodhana Pranayama for a few minutes daily helps to keep the mind calm, happy, peaceful and has numerous mental and physical benefits.

Methods: This research utilized a quasi-experimental pretest - posttest control group design. The study was carried out at Hostel, P I M S, Puducherry. The samples were girl adolescent in the aged 17 -19 years staying in the hostel. Convenience sampling technique was employed. The sample size was 64 (32 experimental group,32 control group). The tool used was a structured questionnaire on demographic variables and a well-being scale by Singh (2011). Intervention was given to the experimental group for 4 weeks, 20 min a day.

Result: In the pre-test, majority of adolescent girls (56.2%) had average, 32.8% had low, and 10.9% had high well-being. The comparative analysis of pretest and posttest levels in the experimental group was found to be statistically significant at p < 0.001 level. The analysis of differences in post-test level between the participants in the experimental and control groups was found to be statistically significant at p<0.027 level, pointing to a significant difference in post-test in both groups.

Conclusion: The intervention increased the level of general well-being and can be practised regularly as a non-pharmacological intervention to improve the general well-being.