Yoga and Self Regulation Strategies for Middle School Students and High School Students
Self-regulation strategies for middle school students and high school students continue to be essential to help children practice inhibition and impulse control. These skills have been associated with academic success and high school graduation rates. One self-regulation strategy for middle school and high school students is yoga.
Self-Regulation Strategies in Middle School Students
The Journal of Child and Family Studies published research on mindful yoga to foster self-regulation, academic performance and health promotion in 72 sixth graders. Students participated in mindful yoga integrated into 6th grade English Language Arts and 70 students were part of the control group. Data on self-regulation was collected using the Adolescent Self-Regulatory Inventory.
The results indicated that the students who participated in mindful yoga demonstrated significant increases in both global and long-term self-regulation compared to the control group of students. There were no significant changes in short-term self-regulation.
Self-Regulation Strategies in High School Students
An additional study was published by Daly et al. comparing a yoga intervention on the emotion regulation of 15-17 year old high school students as compared to physical education. Following a 16-week yoga intervention (n = 19) or regular PE (n = 18), data analyses indicated that emotional regulation increased significantly in the yoga group as compared to the physical education group.
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References:
Bergen-Cico, D. et al. Fostering Self-Regulation Through Curriculum Infusion of Mindful Yoga: A Pilot Study of Efficacy and Feasibility. Journal of Child and Family Studies. November 2015, Volume 24, Issue 11, pp 3448-3461
Daly, LA et al. Yoga and Emotion Regulation in High School Students: A Randomized Controlled Trial. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2015;2015:794928. doi: 10.1155/2015/794928. Epub 2015 Aug 19.