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HYPOTHESIS AND THEORY
published: 26 July 2021
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.585300
Frontiers in Psychology | www.frontiersin.org 1July 2021 | Volume 12 | Article 585300
Edited by:
Manuel De Vega,
University of La Laguna, Spain
Reviewed by:
Chryssoula Karakitsou,
American College of Greece, Greece
Qianguo Xiao,
Chongqing University of Arts and
Sciences, China
*Correspondence:
Laura Tolbaños-Roche
laura_tolbanos@yahoo.es
Specialty section:
This article was submitted to
Theoretical and Philosophical
Psychology,
a section of the journal
Frontiers in Psychology
Received: 20 July 2020
Accepted: 09 June 2021
Published: 26 July 2021
Citation:
Tolbaños-Roche L and Menon P
(2021) Applying the S-ART Framework
to Yoga: Exploring the Self-Regulatory
Action of Yoga Practice in Two
Culturally Diverse Samples.
Front. Psychol. 12:585300.
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.585300
Applying the S-ART Framework to
Yoga: Exploring the Self-Regulatory
Action of Yoga Practice in Two
Culturally Diverse Samples
Laura Tolbaños-Roche 1
*and Praseeda Menon 2
1Department of Clinical Psychology, Psychobiology and Methodology, Section of Psychology, Faculty of Health Sciences,
Universidad de La Laguna, San Cristóbal de La Laguna, Spain, 2Scientific Research Department, Kaivalyadhama Yoga
Institute, Lonavala, India
Mindfulness practices form the core of numerous therapeutic programs and interventions
for stress reduction and the treatment of different health conditions related to stress and
life habits. Ways and means to regulate oneself effectively also form the foundation of the
path of yoga in the accomplishment of holistic health and well-being. The self-awareness,
self-regulation, and self-transcendence (S-ART) model can be considered as an
overarching neurobiological framework to explain the self-regulatory mechanisms of
well-being present in mindfulness-based practices. The current study, by connecting
and applying the S-ART framework to the self-regulatory mechanisms in yoga and
generating related hypotheses, provides a theory-led explanation of the action of yoga
practices, which is sparse in the literature. Testing the S-ART model in yoga in two
culturally diverse samples, assessing the model-mapped psychological mechanisms
of action, and exploring the influence of perseverance in yoga practice are the
original contributions of this study. The study sample comprised 362 yoga practitioners
and non-practitioners (197 Indian and 165 Spanish), who completed four tests of
psychological variables indicative of the aforementioned three S-ART abilities. These
tests were Multidimensional Assessment of Interoceptive Awareness (MAIA), Experiences
Questionnaire-Decentering (EQ-D) subscale, Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale
(DERS), and Relational Compassion Scale (RCS). The results indicated significantly better
self-awareness and self-regulatory abilities in yoga practitioners (Indian and Spanish
in a combination) than non-practitioners, reflected in higher levels of interoceptive
awareness and decentering abilities. Moreover, perseverance in yoga practice acted as
a significant predictor of self-awareness and self-regulation in practitioners. An analysis
of each cultural sample revealed some differences. Yoga practice and perseverance
in it acted as a significant predictor of interoceptive awareness and decentering in
Indian practitioners having more than 1 year of sustained yoga practice, but for the
Spanish participants, physical exercise and frequency of yoga practice acted as better
predictors of interoceptive awareness and decentering in comparison to yoga practice
and perseverance in it. The obtained results suggested that the S-ART model provided
Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
preliminary but promising evidence for the self-regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga
practice within a culturally diverse sample of yoga practitioners. This study also widens
the scope of generating further hypotheses using the S-ART theoretical framework for
testing the self-regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga practice.
Keywords: yoga, S-ART model, self-regulatory action, well-being, yoga practitioners
INTRODUCTION
Mindfulness and Yoga
Mindfulness practices form the core of numerous therapeutic
programs and interventions for stress reduction and the
treatment of different health conditions related to stress and life
habits. The foundation of these therapeutic programs was based
on an important school of thought and practice that emerged in
recent years within the western cognitive-behavioral therapeutic
approach. This approach itself is rooted in ancient Buddhist
practices of meditation, such as Sattipatth¯
ana meditation,
involving the cultivation of the mindfulness faculty as a means
for generating concentration and insight (vipassan¯
a, or clear
insight). The most significant intervention programs based on
this approach, which have also been applied in most of the
published research, are the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction
(MBSR) program (Kabat-Zinn, 1990) and Mindfulness-Based
Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) program (Segal et al., 2002).
The popularity of yoga, an Eastern (Indian) mind-body
practice, has been growing year by year worldwide. Ways and
means to regulate oneself effectively form the foundation of the
path of yoga in the accomplishment of holistic health and well-
being. However, in many cases, yoga, out of its cultural context,
is used only for fitness or, at best, as a body-mind relaxing
technique. Over the past two decades, a growing body of research
proving yoga’s healing benefits has promoted the development of
yoga therapy as a clinical treatment for many health conditions
(Pascoe and Bauer, 2015; Kumar et al., 2016; Haider et al.,
2017; Park and Han, 2017; Thind et al., 2017; Falkenberg et al.,
2018). Scientific evidence as well as the effort of many yoga
institutions, teachers, and therapists, which have spread genuine
yoga teaching for long, have contributed to the universal essence
of yoga.
Modern and Traditional Views
From the contemporary Western perspective, mindfulness can be
defined as “the awareness that emerges through paying attention
on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally to
the unfolding of experience moment to moment” (Kabat-Zinn,
2003). Beyond this definition, from the Buddhist traditional
perspective, mindfulness is the discriminative awareness for
encoding and registering experiences, considerably associated
with ethical development as a direct path to “enlightenment” and
the cessation of suffering (Chiesa, 2013).
The modern view of yoga considers it as a philosophy-
based set of practices and attitudes that focus on the attainment
and maintenance of mind-body balance, reducing psycho-
physiological activation and facilitating a state of mental
calmness as a natural and positive state of mind. The holistic
approach of yoga takes into consideration all aspects related to
health in an integrative manner: healthy diet, physical activity,
breathing techniques, positive thoughts and habits, a health-
promoting lifestyle, the regulation of emotions and emotional
balance, and a creative cognitive process. The systematic stages of
yoga may be thought of as a set of methods to regulate emotions,
thoughts, or behavior to promote well-being (Gard et al., 2014).
The traditional or classical approach of yoga (as per Sage
Patanjali’s Yogasutra, the first exclusively written systematization
of yoga principles and practices in a highly compact verse form)
considers the path of yoga to be a disciplined way of life for the
spiritual seeker, a way that leads to the removal of the root cause
of human suffering. This root cause is identified as “ignorance”
or avidy¯
a(a=absence of +vidy¯
a=the real knowledge worth
knowing for spiritual aim; Karambelkar, 1986, p. 177). More
precisely, yoga is equated with “the complete cessation of the
functional modifications of the citta.” Although there is no
exact equivalent in English, the citta could be translated as the
“mind” for practical understanding (Karambelkar, 1986, p. 5–7).
Therefore, yoga can be said to be the path for the removal of all
disturbances of the mind that cause suffering.
The path of yoga as per the Yogasutra, called Asht¯
anga Yoga,
and also referred to as R¯
aja Yoga, involves eight limbs or stages:
yama (ethical observances), niyama (self-disciplines), ¯
asana
(postures), pr¯
an¯
ay¯
ama (breath regulation), praty¯
ah¯
ara (sensory
withdrawal), dh¯
arana (concentration), dhy¯
ana (meditation), and
sam¯
adhi (self-transcendence). All of them are to be practiced
simultaneously from the beginning to make progress on the
path. The practice of these steps is expected to develop, in the
practitioner, attention and awareness as a tool for discriminative
knowledge (viveka-khy¯
ati), which bestows the ability to perceive
reality as it “truly” is, simply put, the ability to perceive
phenomena without biases of any sort. The ability to see reality
clearly without bias is a highly revered self-regulatory tool
both within the yoga and the mindfulness traditions (Vago and
Silbersweig, 2012; Gard et al., 2014). The final aim of yoga is the
re-establishment of the seer or the observer within (drasht¯
a) in its
own form (swarupa) (Karambelkar, 1986, p. 9) or the realization
of one’s “true” self. Here, “true” has the connotation of the purest
and the most pristine form of oneself, which as per yoga and
Hindu philosophy is believed to be that of “total bliss.”
Culture as a Salient Contributor
People from different cultures vary in psychological processes—
for example, fundamental processes such as attention (Miyamoto
et al., 2006), and temporal ones such as daily variability
in affective experiences (Oishi et al., 2004), and the studies
investigating the extent of such cultural variation/similarity are
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
of critical importance to progress in the field of psychological
science (Heine and Norenzayan, 2006). Interdependent self-
construals have been observed in more collectivistic Eastern
cultures, where attending to others, fitting in, and harmonious
relatedness with them are prioritized. On the other hand,
independent self-construals have been observed in more
individualistic Western cultures, wherein the priority shifts
to maintaining independence from others by distinguishing
oneself from others and by discovering and expressing one’s
unique inner attributes. The underlying cultural mechanisms of
psychological processes such as interdependent vs. independent
self-construals can exert a systematic influence on various
fundamental aspects of cognition, emotion, and motivation
(Markus and Kitayama, 1991). Culturally divergent self-
construals can differentially affect other psychological processes
such as inherent motivations for self-enhancement (Heine
et al., 1999) and cognitive tendencies such as analytic vs.
holistic thinking (Heine and Norenzayan, 2006). Furthermore,
people from collectivistic cultures may be relatively more likely
to attend to context than people in individualistic cultures
(Chentsova-Dutton and Dzokoto, 2014). Additionally, meta-
analysis has revealed the cultural differences between Asian and
Western study samples in self-report measures of individualism-
collectivism (Cohen’s dof 0.39 for individualism and 0.24
for collectivism) (Oishi et al., 2004), pointing to the role
of underlying culture-specific processes in the self-reports of
psychological phenomena.
Scientific literature analyzing the cultural differences
or similarities in the action of mind-body practices of
mindfulness, particularly that of yoga, and the psychological
processes underlying them is very sparse. When cultural
context (Taiwanese vs. European American participants)
and mindfulness were examined by Kahn et al. (2017) in
relation to distress disclosure, depression symptoms, and life
satisfaction, mindfulness levels moderated the relationship
between distress disclosure and both depression symptoms and
life satisfaction only in the Taiwanese participants but not in
European Americans. This study pointed out that the benefits
of disclosing distress were dependent not only on cultural
context but, for the Taiwanese sample, also on mindfulness. Yoga
interventions conducted as a part of research studies in India
may usually contain the core practices rooted in Indian culture,
for example, mantra chanting, which are typically not found in
yoga research studies conducted in Western cultures (Wang,
2009). Thus, cultural differences either in yoga practitioners or in
the effects of yoga may also emerge due to culture-specific ways
of administering and absorbing yoga practices.
Cultural contexts also differ in their emphasis on foundational
psychological processes, such as interoceptive awareness.
Interoceptive awareness, or the awareness of bodily sensations
and responsiveness to them, is one of the key abilities’ yoga
practices have shown to enhance (Rani and Rao, 1994;
Daubenmier, 2005; Impett et al., 2006). A few studies
demonstrated that people from non-Western cultures were
more likely to exhibit higher levels of bodily awareness than their
Western counterparts (Chentsova-Dutton and Dzokoto, 2014),
with East-Asians more likely to emphasize their bodily states
when describing themselves and their emotional experiences
(Ma-Kellams, 2014).
Emotion regulation, in particular, and self-regulation in
general, is yet another basic psychological process that is
affected by culture, as also a key mechanism of action of
yoga practice (Gard et al., 2014). When looking at the impact
of culture on emotion regulation, Ford and Mauss (2015),
in their review, suggested that culture shapes the extent to
which individuals are motivated to regulate emotions, further
determining the likelihood of whether emotion regulation
actually takes place. They also inferred that individuals oriented
toward interdependent cultural values may be more motivated to
regulate their emotions by using the emotion regulation strategy
of “expression suppression” as they may perceive it as adaptive
based on their cultural beliefs, whereas those oriented toward
independent cultural values may be less likely to do so as they
may perceive this strategy as maladpative for their well-being.
Divergent self-construals in culturally diverse contexts, as
mentioned earlier, are also likely to affect one’s relationship with
the self as well as that with others, an aspect that yoga also
affects. When the relationships between self-compassion and
relationally interdependent self-construal were examined, the
interdependent self-construal was found to be positively related
to self-kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness factors
of self-compassion, and negatively correlated to self-judgment,
isolation, and over-identification factors of self-compassion
(Akin and Eroglu, 2013). In terms of social relatedness, a review
of the evidence suggested that compared to European Americans,
Asians and Asian Americans tend to shy away from explicit social
support because of the concerns with potential negative relational
consequences of such behavior (Kim et al., 2008).
Although the above studies make a strong case for culture as
an influential variable in psychological studies, some studies have
identified mindfulness as a cross-culturally similar psychological
process. Ghorbani et al. (2009) found similar patterns of positive
correlation of mindfulness with the self-reported adjustment
comparing the participants from Iran (Middle Eastern culture)
and the USA (Western culture). In yet another study, Ivtzan
et al. (2018) found that after an 8-week online Mindfulness-
Based Flourishing Program (MBFP), both British and Chinese
(Hong Kong based) experimental groups showed significant
improvements, with large effect sizes, in mindfulness, gratitude,
self-compassion, meaning, and negative affect compared to a
control group, providing preliminary evidence for the MBFP’s
cross-cultural validity. The authors concluded that the structured
mindfulness-based programs lead to a similar cross-cultural
pattern of benefits even when the initial understanding of
mindfulness might have been different.
Despite the conflicting evidence related to culture-specific
patterns in the field of mindfulness and yoga, cultural
psychological research has “demonstrated that culture is
implicated at a much more fundamental level of psychological
processing than what was previously considered” (Heine and
Norenzayan, 2006, p. 253). In fact, the inconsistent results in the
above studies drive home the point that culture is an important
factor to consider in psychological research, especially when
culturally rooted practices, such as yoga, form a part of the
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
research. Including culture as a factor in such psychological
research will help accumulate a robust evidence-base, in turn
determining the extent to which psychological processes related
to mindfulness and yoga may be uniform across cultures or have
culture-specific qualifiers, and thereby variations.
The Self-Awareness, Self-Regulation, and
Self-Transcendence Model
A comprehensive self-awareness, self-regulation, and self-
transcendence (S-ART) model was developed by synthesizing
the Eastern (Buddhist) traditional approaches and the Western
mindfulness models with the objective of explaining the
self-processing and neurological mechanisms underlying
mindfulness. The S-ART model has provided an empirical
framework to clarify how mindfulness reduces suffering,
regulates emotions, stabilizes the mind, and develops a state of
health and well-being (Vago and Silbersweig, 2012). The S-ART
model has focused on two specific mindfulness meditation
practices: focused-attention concentration practice and open-
monitoring receptive practice (Lutz et al., 2007, 2008), and
some practices to enhance ethics and develop qualities such as
loving-kindness, compassion, and forgiveness (Ricard, 2003).
The S-ART model assumes that our perceptions, cognitions,
and emotions are filtered by self-processing biases such as
previous experiences, dispositional factors, psychological and
cognitive habits, etc. These biases modify attention, perception,
and cognition, “coloring” the representation of the world and
of one’s self, and transforming the “neutral” events into positive
or negative experiences. Furthermore, affect-biased attention
has been associated with affective states and symptomatology
such as anxiety and depression (Yiend, 2010). In this context,
mindfulness practices could generate the ability to be aware
of the experiences as they genuinely are: with objectivity, and
without biases and personal interpretations. According to the
S-ART model, mindfulness training could reduce these biases
through the development of three abilities: “self-awareness,”
or meta-awareness of the self; “self-regulation,” the ability to
manage responses and impulses; and “self-transcendence,” the
expansion of the boundary of the self to include others, the
development of positive relationships between self and other,
and a prosocial attitude. The evolution of these three abilities
modulates neurobiological changes and cognitive improvements
through the integrative frontoparietal control network (Vago and
Silbersweig, 2012).
As per the S-ART model, there are six neurocognitive
mechanisms that underlie the abovementioned mindfulness
process, which contribute to enhancing the three S-ART abilities,
reducing self-biases, and maintaining a healthy mind. They are
as follows:
1. Motivation and Intention: They are essential pillars to cultivate
mindfulness. In the beginning, the motivation to do a certain
practice is oriented to get some experiences and results, but
with the advancement of the practice, the motivation becomes
internally focused. Intention helps to follow a specific plan in
the development of practice.
2. Attention Regulation: It is improved with the help of
mindfulness practice. Advances in neuroscience research
suggest a change in attention-related networks after meditative
and contemplative training. Attentional effort decreases, and
the efficiency of attentional networks improves over time
with practice.
3. Emotion Regulation: Mindfulness practices also “strengthen
neural systems important for emotion regulation (Vago and
Silbersweig, 2012, p. 18).” Self-awareness through mindfulness
practices supports the development of abilities of non-
attachment and decentering. These abilities help to neutralize
the negative burden of the stressor, manifesting more
flexibility and openness rather than rigidity and reactivity in
emotional responses. This ultimately leads to an equanimous
attitude toward life situations.
4. Extinction and Reconsolidation: Mindfulness reduces and
removes maladaptive habits and conditioning, transforming
them into more positive and adaptive behaviors. The S-
ART model proposes the hypothesis that this form of
transformation uses the neural circuitry associated with
extinction and reconsolidation. The biases of attention and
memory related to habitual distortions would be extinguished
and reconsolidated.
5. Prosociality: Mindfulness practices improve empathy. Self-
awareness promotes a vision of interdependence with others,
removing distinctions and boundaries between self and others.
As a result, the attitudes of loving-kindness and compassion
emerge in a natural way.
6. Non-attachment and Decentering: Awareness of the
subjectivity and temporary nature of feelings, emotions,
and thoughts lead to non-attachment, promoting openness
and flexibility in life, and a perception of higher well-being and
satisfaction with oneself and with interpersonal relationships.
Decentering is defined as “the ability to observe one’s thoughts
and feelings as temporary, objective events in the mind, as
opposed to reflections of the self that are necessarily true
(Fresco et al., 2007).” Through mindfulness practice, an
inner space is created in which thoughts are seen with more
objectivity, and emotions, after being recognized, can be
reappraised taking a wider and more expansive perspective,
possibly having them lose their intensity.
The S-ART Model in Yoga
As mentioned previously and similar to the Buddhist approach,
which states, in the Four Noble Truths, that there is a way
leading to the cessation of human suffering (Thera, 1993),
yoga represents the pathway to the liberation of this suffering
(Karambelkar, 1986). This should not be surprising as the
ancient Buddhist texts and the traditional yoga texts have
clear connections and mutual historical influences over time
(Basavaraddi, 2015). The practice of yoga leads to an internal
transformation that is reflected both in well-being in the physical,
functional, emotional, cognitive, and behavioral levels as well as
in interpersonal relationships and social health. Yoga builds and
strengthens the internal body-mind resources with the final result
of a better quality of life, which is internally based rather than
externally based (Satish, 2010).
Gard et al. (2014) have proposed a theoretical framework
based on an integrative systems network model to explain
how yoga can optimize self-regulation through bottom-up and
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
top-down self-regulatory processes across cognitive, emotional,
behavioral, and physiological domains in the context of stress.
Taking the remarkable theoretical contributions of Gard et al.
(2014) and Vago and Silbersweig (2012) a step further, the current
researchers propose that the common aim, connections, and
mutual influences between Buddhist and yoga practices, make
the S-ART model a suitable and valid theoretical framework to
explain the self-regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga practice
too. The following paragraphs explain the development of the
three abilities of S-ART from both the theoretical and practical
perspectives of yoga.
1. Self-Awareness: Self-awareness can be considered as the core
feature of yoga practice too. Practices from various traditions
of yoga including Asht¯
anga Yoga and Hatha Yoga, which
comprise the practices of ¯
asana, pr¯
an¯
ay¯
ama, relaxation,
meditation (dh¯
arana and dhy¯
ana), and other yoga practices,
are aimed at developing an awareness of one’s body, emotions,
and thoughts. Through this form of body-mind training
in developing awareness consciously during specific yoga
practice as well as during several activities of daily life, there
are greater probabilities of establishing a “witnessing self.”
This “witnessing self,” referred to as the seer or the observer-
within (drasht¯
a) previously, confers the ability to perceive
reality without biases and preconceived notions in the long
run. Through the conscious cultivation of self-awareness, and
thereby self-witnessing, yoga can lead to the integration and
attunement of the organism’s systemic unity encompassing the
body, mind, and environment. Mindful awareness is a form
of intrapersonal attunement and self-regulation. Furthermore,
attunement to oneself has been proposed as the promoter of
physical and psychological well-being (Siegel, 2007).
2. Self-Regulation: The regulation of attention, emotion,
thought, action, relationships, and morality all have
integration at its core (Siegel, 2019). As noted previously, yoga
leads to the integration of all levels of experience (physical,
emotional, and cognitive) and all aspects of human life
(diet, habits, physical activity, breathing, thoughts, emotions,
relationships, and ethical behavior) through practicing the
path of the eight limbs of yoga as well as cultivating a healthy
yogic lifestyle. This integration through yoga brings about
self-regulation. Moreover, the current western theories of
interpersonal neurobiology (Ogden et al., 2009; Siegel, 2010)
have emphasized integration as a basis of well-being too.
Self-awareness: is the central axis from which it is possible
to integrate different levels of the human experience. This
capacity of self-awareness to integrate aspects of the body,
mind, and the environment has been proposed as the central
mechanism underlying self-regulation and health (Siegel,
2012). Furthermore, the Western theories of the “embodied
mind” (Varela et al., 1991) and the “extended mind” (Clark
and Chalmers, 1998) derived from modern research in several
scientific fields of psychology, linguistics, and cognitive science
locate cognition as a process resulting from the interaction
between the different body systems and their relationship with
the environment (Garavito, 2013). These theories have also
been used to explain the concept of integration in emotional
processes (Barrett et al., 2005). Thus, the integration of body,
mind, and their relationship with the environment can be
considered as the main process underlying well-being.
The above theories support the notion that the mind and the
body are intimately related and they continuously influence
each other in a circular feedback. As a result of this interaction,
and thereby integration, the basic sense of being alive, wherein
the experience of the body plays a fundamental role, ensues
and “the physical body becomes a lived and experienced
body or the basis of self-awareness” (Fuchs, 2012). Deriving
from this perspective, body-awareness can be considered as
the foundation of the sense of identity because it is the
consciousness of the body that would generate the awareness
of itself. In other words, the consciousness of the body (body-
awareness) itself is the foundation of self-awareness.
An example of how therapy can be based on body-
awareness is provided by the “model of sensorimotor therapy”
(Ogden et al., 2009), wherein the integration of all levels
of experience—sensorimotor, emotional, and cognitive—starts
with an awareness of body sensations. In the same way,
starting from a visceral, sensorial and motor awareness, and
through the development of “bottom-up” as well as “top-
down” awareness of emotional and cognitive processes, yoga
practices act on all levels of experience-organization (physical,
emotional and cognitive), facilitate their integration, and
thereby bring about self-regulation and well-being. Supporting
this idea is the previously cited study of Gard et al. (2014)
regarding the potential self-regulatory mechanisms of yoga
for psychological health. The authors posit that yoga practices
would lead to self-regulation through both the promotion of
behavioral changes as well as the inhibition of a non-desirable
output by both higher-level and lower-level brain networks
when facing stress-related challenges, with a consequent
positive impact on health and well-being. In their review, the
authors also provided sufficient empirical evidence for the
association between yoga and self-regulation across cognitive,
behavioral, autonomic, and emotion domains.
3. Self-Transcendence: The final step (i.e., aim) of Asth¯
anga
Yoga is a state of self-transcendence, and all its preceding
steps facilitate the accomplishment of this final aim. The
first two limbs in Asth¯
anga Yoga of yama and niyama,
the observances related to social and personal conduct,
respectively, lead to the regulation of aspects related to
the self and others. The five yama, as per the Yogasutra,
of ahimsa (nonviolence), satya (truthfulness), asteya (non-
stealing), brahmacharya (right use of energy), and aparigraha
(non-hoarding) help to regulate one’s behavior and promote
adherence to ethical values in the society at large. The five
niyama as per the Yogasutra of shaucha (cleanliness), santosha
(contentment), tapas (discipline and austerity), sw¯
adhy¯
aya
(study of the self and of the sacred texts), and ishvara-
pranidh¯
ana (surrender to or contemplation of a higher power)
all help to discipline, calm down, and pacify the mind.
The next three limbs, after yama and niyama, of ¯
asana (steady
and comfortable bodily postures), pr¯
an¯
ay¯
ama (voluntary
regulation of breath), and praty¯
ah¯
ara (inward withdrawal of
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
the senses) relate to working with one’s physical, physiological,
and psychological aspects with conscious awareness and
regulating those levels of experience in a stepwise manner.
The last three limbs of dh¯
arana, dhy¯
ana, and sam¯
adhi involve
working with the subtler and more spiritual aspects of the
mind, by taking the inward withdrawal in praty¯
ah¯
ara to
higher and more refined levels, and honing one’s degree
of attention step-by-step through building concentration
(dh¯
arana), attaining deeper meditative states (dhy¯
ana), and,
finally, transcending the self (sam¯
adhi).
The Yogasutra also provides a practical and powerful
technique to discipline oneself to have a calm mind during
social behavior. This is the technique of “citta-pras¯
adana,”
which is mentioned in the 33rd verse of its first chapter. From
the assumption that the mind gets disturbed by the existence of
negative attitudes, feelings, and thoughts in relation to others,
the cultivation of specific attitudes—of friendship toward
happy people, of compassion toward people who undergo
suffering, of joy toward others virtues, and of emotional
distance toward the harmful attitudes of others, as well as, the
repeated application of these attitudes—are prescribed as one
of the most powerful ways to achieve “citta-pras¯
adana,” or a
peaceful state of mind (Karambelkar, 1986).
As explained previously, integration is not only the core
of self-regulation, but also the main process underlying
well-being too. Self-awareness fosters the integration of an
individual’s mind, brain, and body, and compassion promotes
the integration of individuals in their relationships, in the
family and the society. According to Siegel (2017), compassion
(the feeling to want to help others), connection (the awareness
of being linked with others), equanimity (the regulation of
one’s own internal state), which in turn allow to maintain
compassion and the sense of connection, and a sense of higher
meaning or purpose (the intention of contributing with others,
the society, and the world in large), are all positive and healing
capacities of the mind related to integration.
The systematic observance of the eight limbs of Asth¯
anga
Yoga as well as the method of “citta-pras¯
adana,” leads to
a state of equilibrium in the body-mind complex, peace,
and clarity of mind, and ultimately, to illumination or real
knowledge of the unity of existence both within and outside.
When the practitioner achieves this enlightenment or “self-
realization,” as it is called in yoga, it leads to the realization
that there is no difference between the self and the other,
thereby generating a natural feeling of love toward every living
creature. This is the accomplishment of self-transcendence.
Perseverance in Yoga Practice
The significance of the maintenance of yoga practice for
accomplishing complete tranquility of mind can be observed in
the Yogasutra. For example, the 12th and the 13th verse from
the first chapter of the Yogasutra emphasize the significance
of repeated yoga practice in order to achieve steadiness in a
state of freedom from those vrtti (functional modifications of
the mind; Karambelkar, 1986), which apparently prevent one
from experiencing the moment as it is. The next verse (14th)
from the same chapter clearly states that practice gets firmly
grounded when it has been adopted for a long duration of
time, in an uninterrupted manner, and with a receptive attitude
(Karambelkar, 1986). Furthermore, as per the Yogasutra, in
order to achieve a peaceful mind through the cultivation of the
suggested attitudes of “citta-pras¯
adana,” mentioned earlier, they
need to be repeated and sustained over time for reversing the
negative tendencies of the mind.
The degree of accomplishment in yoga also depends
on the intensity of the yoga practitioner’s urge (Yogasutra-
−1st chapter, 21st sutra). Furthermore, even in those with
intense urge, the Yogasutra has mentioned three categories
of yoga practitioners (mrudu—mild, madhya—medium, and
adhim¯
atra—extraordinary) depending on the efforts taken and
the commitment toward yoga practice (Yogasutra-−1st chapter,
22nd sutra). Thus, it is apt to conclude that the Yogasutra has
laid a special emphasis on the significance of sustained and
committed practice of the eight limbs of Asht¯
anga Yoga for
achieving discriminative knowledge (viveka-khy¯
ati) (Yogasutra-
−2nd chapter, 28th sutra;Karambelkar, 1986), the meta-ability
to have an overall unbiased perception of phenomena.
Research studying the direct contribution or influence of
perseverance in yoga practice on various aspects of well-
being is, as yet, few and far between. One of the few studies
directly measuring this to some extent is a single-arm study
of a 2-month yoga immersion program with 19 participants,
which demonstrated that higher amounts of yoga practice were
associated with increased body awareness, positive affect, and
satisfaction with life, as well as decreased negative affect for both
women and men (Impett et al., 2006).
Overview of the Present Study
Our study had two main objectives and one exploratory objective.
The first main objective of the current study, in line with the
arguments made in the section Introduction, was to build on
the S-ART model, and propose it as a theoretical framework to
explain the self-regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga practice.
As its second main objective, the current study aimed at
producing preliminary empirical evidence for the S-ART model
in yoga by investigating the action of yoga practice on the
psychological variables mapped to the S-ART foundational
abilities of self-awareness,self-regulation, and self-transcendence
in a sample of yoga practitioners and non-practitioners (NP).
Although some evidence exists on the role of yoga in relation
to each of these S-ART meta-abilities, our study will be the
first to study all of them comprehensively at one time within a
sound theoretical framework, which is expected to produce some
novel insights.
Evidence related to the action of yoga in interoceptive
awareness has already been cited earlier. Interoceptive awareness
can be considered as a key starting point to activate self-
awareness mechanisms. Also, an awareness of interoceptive
experience facilitates the integration across various layers of
human functioning, and yoga offers a way to practice this
integration, which can also be considered as a form of self-
regulation (Gard et al., 2014).
Regarding evidence related to the second S-ART meta-ability
of self-regulation, in a review of 24 articles on the emotion
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
regulation potential of yoga practice, Menezes et al. (2015)
found evidence of the effect of yoga in the improvement of
emotional functioning in both healthy subjects and people who
suffer from different health conditions. This evidence suggests
that yoga can help to promote healthier psychological responses
and it is a potential emotion regulation strategy working
through mechanisms such as reappraisal, attention regulation,
self-monitoring, self-awareness, and autonomic regulation. Gard
et al. (2014), based on evidence reviewed from various studies, in
which yoga aided and promoted self-regulation across cognitive,
emotional, behavioral, and autonomic domains, proposed a
model for the self-regulatory mechanisms of yoga in well-
being. Previous research by the first author of the current
study also explored the role of yoga on self-regulation, showing
that practicing yoga had a beneficial effect on physiological,
emotional, and cognitive self-regulation in patients who suffered
from essential arterial hypertension (Tolbaños Roche et al., 2017).
Although there is little evidence addressing the role of yoga in
self-transcendence, some studies have demonstrated preliminary
results for a higher level of this third S-ART meta-ability in
regular yoga practitioners, compared to NP (Fiori et al., 2014)
and also after a single session of yoga (Park et al., 2020), as
well as in prison inmates (Griera, 2017). A few studies have
also demonstrated preliminary positive results for the social
connectedness aspect of yoga (see Park et al., 2020). As self-
transcendence is also considered as the social component related
to yoga practice, which helps to promote interdependence (Gard
et al., 2014), these studies on social connectedness tend to support
the case for psychological mechanisms of self-transcendence
in yoga.
Previous evidence has shown positive results with yoga
practice in shorter interventions. However, some of the studies
have remarked the importance of regularity of practice,
demonstrating that more practice was associated with lower
mood disturbances (Khalsa et al., 2012), cognitive emotion
regulation (Gootjes et al., 2011), and greater well-being and
quality of sleep (Danhauer et al., 2009). Therefore, as a part of its
second objective, our study aimed at studying how perseverance
in yoga practice (long-term yoga practice) further contributed to
the self-regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga.
There remains a substantive gap in our knowledge about
how Western models of psychological processes, such as body
consciousness, emerge—or fail to emerge—in other cultural
contexts (Ma-Kellams, 2014). Moreover, we also found a lack of
adequate studies looking at the role of different cultural contexts
in yoga, particularly related to that of the self-regulatory action
in yoga practice. Therefore, we thought that it is important
to explore the role of yoga, within the S-ART model, in two
culturally diverse contexts—that of the collectivistic Eastern
culture of India and that of the individualistic Western culture of
Spain. This formed part of our third exploratory objective, which
could possibly help to generate worthwhile information for the
formulation of hypotheses in future research.
Based on the evidence cited above, we formulated two
hypotheses in relation to the second objective of the study. We
expected higher levels of S-ART in yoga practitioners compared
to NP, as well as in longer-term practitioners. We did not
formulate any hypothesis related to the third objective regarding
the role of yoga in two culturally diverse samples as our study was
an exploratory study in this regard.
Each of the three abilities of the S-ART model was
appropriately mapped to four psychological variables of
interoceptive awareness (multidimensional), decentering,
emotion regulation, and relational compassion, with the middle
two variables used as indicators of self-regulation. These model-
mapped variables were treated as our outcome psychological
variables, and were measured by using the standard psychological
instruments elaborated in the next section. Very few studies
have attempted to take a multidimensional view of variables
such as somatic awareness (one of the key skills implicated in
interoceptive awareness) when dealing with different cultural
contexts. Given the need for a greater precision in defining the
nature of observed cultural variations, research would benefit
with a more systematic use of multidimensional measures, for
example, the Multidimensional Assessment of Interoceptive
Awareness (MAIA; Mehling et al., 2012), in culturally diverse
contexts (Ma-Kellams, 2014). In line with this suggestion, our
study attempted to take a multidimensional view of the S-ART
meta-abilities when selecting the psychological instruments to
measure them.
METHODS
Participants
The total sample in this cross-sectional study consisted of 362
participants (197 Indian and 165 Spanish) of both genders (98
males and 264 females), between 17 and 77 years old. The mean
age was 40.27 (SD 14.06). Of the total sample, 232 participants
were yoga practitioners and 125 participants were NP, with a
larger proportion of the Indian sample being practitioners (147,
76.56%) compared to NP (45, 23.4%) whereas the Spanish sample
being more equally divided between practitioners (85, 51.52%)
and NP (80, 48.48%). The Indian sample of yoga practitioners as
well as NP (never or <1 month of yoga practice) was constituted
by the students enrolled in the short-term certificate yoga
courses (1–3 months) conducted through the Mumbai, Pune,
and Lonavala branches/collaborative centers of a traditional yoga
institute in Western India, life members and regular participants
taking yoga classes at the Mumbai health center of the said yoga
institute, participants visiting the Lonavala health center of the
said yoga institute for 1–3 weeks of health and rejuvenation
programs, as well as employees of the said yoga institute from
their Mumbai and Lonavala locations. The Spanish sample of
yoga practitioners was composed mainly of the participants from
the regular yoga classes at a yoga studio located at Las Palmas,
Canary Islands, Spain, whereas the NP were mainly the students
of Medicine and Psychology coming from the three different
national universities located in the mainland of Spain and one
national university located in Tenerife, Spain.
The aforementioned yoga institute in India and the yoga
studio in Spain, from where mainly the yoga practitioner data
were collected, both taught traditional Asht¯
anga Yoga, and
encouraged its participants and students to practice all the
yoga practices of ¯
asana,pr¯
an¯
ay¯
ama, relaxation, and meditation
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
every day. Many participants of the study combined the
studies with their professional careers or other occupations.
Apart from collecting data about the study variables, we also
gathered sociodemographic data and information related to the
participant’s yoga practice.
Instruments
The standard psychological instruments used in the current study
were used to measure the dependent psychological variables
mapped to the aforementioned three S-ART abilities. The six
neurocognitive mechanisms underlying the mindfulness process
in the framework of the S-ART model formed a basis for the
selection of these psychological instruments.
The original English and the validated Spanish version of
the MAIA (Mehling et al., 2012; Valenzuela Moguillansky
and Reyes-Reyes, 2015) were used to measure self-awareness
in terms of interoceptive awareness, attention, emotional
awareness, and to measure self-regulation. This is a 32-item
multidimensional instrument with eight subscales of three to
seven items each. The subscales are: Noticing, Not-distracting,
Not-Worrying, Attention Regulation, Emotional Awareness,
Self-Regulation, Body Listening, and Trusting. For this scale,
Cronbach’s alphas in the range between 0.66 and 0.82 have
been obtained.
Although two of the MAIA subscales of attention regulation
and self-regulation do assess self-regulation, it is assessed mainly
in terms of the ability to sustain and control attention to body
sensations. Moreover, the main aim of these two subscales is
the assessment of body awareness. Therefore, we decided to use
additional scales assessing other aspects of self-regulation, such as
the cognitive ability of decentering, the difficulties encountered
when regulating emotion, or emotion regulation deficit.
The original English and the validated Spanish version of
the Decentering subscale of the Experiences Questionnaire-
Decentering (Fresco et al., 2007; Soler et al., 2014; EQ-D) were
used to measure self-regulation in terms of decentering ability.
Decentering is defined as the ability to observe one’s thoughts and
feelings in a detached manner. The EQ-D subscale contains 11
items, with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.89.
The English Brief Version of the Difficulties in Emotion
Regulation Scale (DERS; Victor and Klonsky, 2016) and
the Spanish translation (acquired by the Computer Assisted
Culturally Informed and Flexible Family Based Treatment for
Adolescents study team of the University of Miami) were
also used to measure self-regulation through the evaluation of
difficulties in emotion regulation. This 18-item scale is composed
of the strongest items from each of the six subscales from
the original DERS publication (Gratz and Roemer, 2004), with
subscale alphas ranging from 0.77 to 0.90 and an alpha of 0.91 for
the entire scale. The test subscales are: Awareness, Clarity, Goals,
Impulse, Non-acceptance, and Strategies.
The original English and the validated Spanish version of
the Relational Compassion Scale (RCS; Hacker, 2008; Garcia-
Campayo et al., 2014) were used to measure self-transcendence in
terms of the development of positive relationships between self
and other, and prosocial abilities. This 16-item scale comprises
four subscales: self-self, others-self, self-others, others-others
with the Cronbach’s alpha for the subscales ranging from
acceptable to good: 0.74–0.84.
Procedure
The data in the current study were obtained through convenient
purposive sampling; although we targeted yoga institutes and
educational set-ups, it was more of a convenience sample.
For the Indian sample, the test administration was done
in person with paper–pencil tests, mostly in groups at
predecided times after explaining the purpose of the study
and obtaining a verbal and written consent of participation.
The Spanish participants were asked to respond to the study
questionnaires in an electronic format through Google forms,
which included detailed information about the study and
informed consent.
Although no formal record of response rate was maintained,
on an average, we can say that for both the Indian and
Spanish samples, it was above 90% as tests were provided to
the participants only after obtaining the verbal consent for
participation in the study and adequate reminders were given
until form completion. There were missing data from five
participants in the total sample.
Data Analyses
The statistical package SPSS, version 15.0, was used for
conducting the data analysis. A one-way ANOVA for the
numerical variables and the chi-squared tests for the categorical
variables were used for analyzing the homogeneity of the two
groups of yoga practitioners and NP in sociodemographic
characteristics of the total sample, life habits, and different aspects
related to the practice of yoga. After this preliminary analysis,
first, the Pearson correlation analysis was conducted to examine
which of the measured sociodemographic characteristics, life
habits, and aspects of yoga practice were significantly correlated
with the four psychological outcome variables of Interoceptive
Awareness, Decentering, Difficulties in Emotional Regulation
(DERS), and Relational Compassion, as measured by MAIA,
EQ-D, DERS, and RCS, respectively. Second, a one-way
Multivariate ANOVA (MANOVA) was employed to test our
first hypothesis and to determine whether there were differences
between yoga practitioners and NP on the total scores of the
outcome variables.
Next, we tested our second hypothesis related to the
contribution of perseverance in yoga practice, measured
by the length of yoga practice in months/years, on the
psychological outcome variables, which showed significantly
higher levels in yoga practitioners in the first hypothesis
testing. The hierarchical regression analysis was conducted to
explore the independent and additive power of perseverance
in yoga practice when sociodemographic characteristics,
life habits, and different aspects of yoga practice, which
showed a significant correlation with these selected outcome
variables, were controlled. In this regression analysis, the
yoga practitioners were categorized into three groups:
beginners (BG; between 1 month and <1 year of practice),
medium-term practitioners (MP; between 1 and 5 years
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
of practice), and long-term practitioners (LP; >5 years
of practice).
Finally, we addressed our third objective of exploring the
specific self-regulatory contribution of yoga in each cultural
sample of Indian and Spanish participants. In order to
fulfill this objective, first, the Pearson correlation analysis was
conducted to examine which of the measured sociodemographic
characteristics, life habits, and aspects of yoga practice in
each of the Indian and Spanish samples were significantly
associated with the four psychological outcome variables. Next,
a one-way MANOVA was performed to determine whether
there were differences between yoga practitioners and NP,
on the total scores of the four outcome variables. In this
MANOVA, the participants of each cultural sample were
divided into three groups of NP (never or <1 month of
yoga practice), BG (1 month to 1 year of yoga practice),
and above 1- year practitioners (AYP; >1 year of yoga
practice), so as to get further exploratory information on
how yoga practice as well as perseverance in it would act
on the outcome variables. As per the results obtained from
this one-way MANOVA analysis on the total scores of the
outcome variables, we conducted an exploratory principal
components analysis (PCA) with Varimax rotation (extraction
criterion: eigenvalue>1) only on the MAIA scale for each
cultural sample. This exploratory PCA was done in order
to examine whether the component/factor structure of the
original MAIA version, represented by its subscales, would
reproduce in both the Indian and Spanish samples, and in the
event of divergence, to determine the MAIA component/factor
structure of each cultural sample, enabling a more detailed
examination of the culture-specific grouping of skills represented
by its component subscales. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was
used to assess the internal consistency reliability of the full
MAIA scale in the total sample, as well as in the full
MAIA scale and in its components (obtained from PCA)
at each cultural sample. We also performed a hierarchical
regression analysis in order to explore the independent and
additive power of the practice of yoga and perseverance in
it on the relevant outcome variables when sociodemographic
characteristics, life habits, and different aspects of yoga
practice, significantly correlated with these outcome variables,
were controlled.
RESULTS
Preliminary Analyses
The descriptive statistics and the statistical significance
of the differences between yoga practitioners and NP in
sociodemographic variables (age, gender, marital status,
education, and occupation), health and life habits (weight,
height, smoking, drinking, and the frequency of physical
exercise), and the differences in percentages among yoga
practitioners on aspects of yoga practice [the type/style of yoga,
frequency of yoga practice, type of (specific) yoga practices, and
length of practice] are shown in Tables 1A–C, respectively.
Main Analyses
Correlations of the Outcome Variables With
Sociodemographic Characteristics, Life Habits, and
Aspects of Yoga Practice
When the association of the four outcome variables with the
sociodemographic characteristics, life habits, and aspects of yoga
practice was analyzed, the results, shown in Table 2, indicated
significant correlations of Interoceptive Awareness (MAIA) with
marital status, physical exercise, frequency of practice, and type
of (yoga) practices, that of decentering (EQ-D) with gender,
education, weight, physical exercise, and frequency of practice,
that of DERS with age, and physical exercise, and that of RCS
with physical exercise.
Differences Between Yoga Practitioners and NP in
the Outcome Variables Scores
When testing our first hypothesis related to the differences
between yoga practitioners and NP in the outcome variables, the
results of MANOVA showed a significant multivariate effect on
the total scores of the outcome variables of MAIA, EQ-D, DERS,
and RCS (F=6.305; p<0.001; df =4; power =0.989). The
tests of between-subject effects reported statistically significant
differences between yoga practitioners and NP in the MAIA (F=
24.457; p<0.001; df =1; power =0.999) and the EQ-D scores
(F=12.143; p=0.001; df =1; power =0.935).
According to the findings mentioned above, yoga practitioners
showed significantly higher interoceptive awareness and
significantly higher decentering ability than NP. Thus, in
support of the first hypothesis, the yoga practitioners in the
current study demonstrated better self-awareness and self-
regulatory abilities (as indicated by the total scores on MAIA and
EQ-D, respectively).
Contribution of Perseverance in Practice of Yoga
Practitioners on the Outcome Variables
The results of the hierarchical regression analysis, shown
in Table 3, indicated that perseverance in yoga practice
(as measured by the length of yoga practice) acted as
a significant contributor of the total MAIA score after
controlling those sociodemographic characteristics (marital
status), life habits (physical exercise), and aspects of
yoga practice (frequency of yoga practice, and type of
practices) that showed a significant correlation with
MAIA. Likewise, perseverance in yoga practice significantly
contributed to the total EQ-D score after controlling those
sociodemographic characteristics (gender, education, and
weight), life habits (physical exercise), and aspects of yoga
practice (frequency of yoga practice) that were significantly
associated with EQ-D.
The abovementioned results from the regression supported
the second hypothesis to a reasonable extent, indicating that
perseverance in yoga practice acted as a significant predictor of
interoceptive awareness, a vital aspect of self-awareness, and self-
regulatory abilities, in the yoga practitioners of the current study.
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
TABLE 1A | Descriptive statistics and differences between yoga practitioners and non-practitioners (NP) in sociodemographic variables.
Practitioners Non-practitioners χ²/F p
(N=232) (N=125)
Age
(M ±SD)
Total 41.62 ±13.18 37.82 ±14.51 5.813 0.016
Females 41.27 ±13.12 37.12 ±14.75
Males 42.60 ±15.58 39.60 ±13.90
Gender (%) 0.151 0.697
Females 73.9% 72.0%
Males 26.1% 28.0%
Nationality (%) 24.467 <0.001
Indian 76.6% (N 147) 23.4% (N 45)
Spanish 51.5% (N 85) 48.5% (N 80)
Marital status (%) 7.775 0.169
Single 40.9% 52.4%
Married 49.8% 40.3%
Separed 1.3% 3.2%
Divorced 4.9% 3.2%
Widow/er 2.7% 0.8%
Others 0.3% 0.0%
Education (%) 25.103 <0.001
Primary 0.0% 1.8%
Middle 6.1% 17.3%
Diploma 19.2% 25.5%
Graduate 33.8% 37.3%
Postgraduate 40.9% 6.5%
Occupation (%) 13.093 0.042
Employed 62.7% 37.3%
Business 9.8% 5.7%
Freelancer 11.6% 5.7%
Student 18.2% 30.1%
Homemaker 15.1% 8.9%
Retired 5.8% 4.9%
Unemployed 2.2% 4.1%
Additional Analyses: Exploration of the Contribution
of Yoga Practice in Each Cultural Sample of Indian
and Spanish Participants
Correlations of the Outcome Variables in Each Cultural
Sample With Sociodemographic Characteristics, Life Habits,
and Aspects of Yoga Practice
When the association of the four outcome variables with
sociodemographic characteristics, life habits, and aspects of yoga
practice were examined for each cultural sample (indicated by
nationality), the results related to the Indian participants, shown
in Table 4, indicated that Interoceptive Awareness (MAIA) was
significantly correlated with smoking and physical exercise, and
decentering (EQ-D) with height and physical exercise.
The results related to the Spanish participants, shown
in Table 5, revealed significant correlations of Interoceptive
Awareness (MAIA) with physical exercise, type of yoga, and
frequency of yoga practice, that of decentering (EQ-D) with
gender, smoking, physical exercise, and type of yoga, that
of DERS with gender, age, weight, frequency of practice,
and type of practices, and that of RCS with the frequency
of practice.
Differences Among NP, BG, and AYP on the Total Scores of
the Outcome Variables and the Results of the Hierarchical
Regression Analysis in Each Cultural Sample
The results of MANOVA showed a statistically significant
multivariate effect on the total scores of MAIA, EQ-D, DERS,
and RCS in the Indian participants (F=2.530; p=0.011;
df =8; power =0.912). The tests of between-subjects effects
displayed statistically significant differences among NP, BG, and
AYP in the MAIA (F=9.312; p<0.001; df =2; power =
0.976), and EQ-D scores (F=6.384; p=0.002; df =2; power
=0.897). The results of the multiple comparisons (Table 6)
showed significantly higher total scores on MAIA and EQ-D of
only AYP in the Indian participants, indicating the influence of
perseverance in yoga practice on the abilities of interoceptive
awareness (self-awareness) and decentering (self-regulation) of
Indian participants in the current study.
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TABLE 1B | Descriptive statistics and differences between yoga practitioners and non-practitioners in weight, height, and life habits.
Practitioners Non-practitioners χ²/F p
(N=232) (N=125)
Weight
(M ±SD)
Total 65.01 ±12.19 66.73 ±13.17 1.479 0.225
Females 61.82 ±10.88 62.38 ±11.37
Males 73.93 ±11.26 78.81 ±9.94
Height
(M ±SD)
Total 163.39 ±11.30 164.68 ±16.04 0.773 0.380
Females 160.04 ±10.53 161.47 ±17.23
Males 172.46 ±7.80 173.37 ±6.78
Smoking (%) 5.123 0.024
No 95.7% 88.2%
Yes 4.26% 11.8%
Alcohol (%) 10.021 0.018
Never 53. 0% 36.0%
Occasionally 42.2% 57.6%
Frequently 2.2% 4.00%
Regularly 2.6% 2.4%
Physical exercise (%) 18.103 <0.001
None 5.8% 15.0%
Low 26.3% 38.3%
Moderate 62.1% 40.0%
High 5.8% 6.7%
The results of the hierarchical regression analysis, shown in
Table 7, indicated that the practice of yoga and perseverance
in it acted as a significant contributor of the total MAIA score
in the Indian participants after controlling those life habits
(smoking and physical exercise) that were significantly correlated
with MAIA. Likewise, yoga practice and perseverance in it
significantly contributed to the total EQ-D score after controlling
those sociodemographic characteristics (height) and life habits
(physical exercise) that were significantly associated with EQ-D.
These results showed that the practice of yoga and perseverance
in it acted as a significant predictor of the abilities of interoceptive
awareness and decentering in the Indian participants of the
current study.
A statistically significant multivariate effect of MANOVA on
the total scores of MAIA, EQ-D, DERS, and RCS in the Spanish
participants was found (F=3.476; p=0.001; df =8; power =
0.980). The tests of between-subjects effects displayed statistically
significant differences among NP, BG, and AYP in MAIA (F=
9.782; p<0.001; df =2; power =0.982) and in EQ-D (F=8.352;
p=0.002; df =2; power =0.961).
However, the results of the hierarchical regression analysis,
shown in Table 8, indicated that, after controlling those
sociodemographic characteristics (marital status), life habits
(physical exercise), and aspects of yoga practice (type of yoga
and frequency of practice) that were significantly correlated with
the total MAIA score, the practice of yoga and perseverance
in it were not its (of MAIA) significant contributors in
the Spanish participants. Likewise, after controlling those
sociodemographic characteristics (gender), life habits (physical
exercise and smoking), and aspects of yoga practice (type of
yoga and frequency of practice) that were significantly correlated
with the total EQ-D score, yoga practice and perseverance in
it did not significantly contribute to it. A detailed look at the
regression results indicated that, in the Spanish participants of the
current study, physical exercise and frequency of yoga practice
emerged as better predictors of the abilities of interoceptive
awareness (self-awareness) and decentering (self-regulation) than
yoga practice and perseverance in it.
Exploratory Factor Analysis of the MAIA Scale in
Each Cultural Sample
It was important to understand the similarity or difference of
factor structure of the MAIA scale in each cultural sample as it
emerged as a significant outcome variable in the aforementioned
MANOVA analysis in both the Indian and Spanish samples.
In the exploratory analyses of the MAIA scale with PCA,
the result of the rotated component matrix for the Indian
participants showed a different component/factor structure
compared to the original English MAIA scale (Mehling et al.,
2012) and the Spanish MAIA scale (Valenzuela Moguillansky
and Reyes-Reyes, 2015), which had demonstrated equivalent
factor structures. Our exploratory PCA showed an eight-
component/factor model as the best model fit for the Indian
participants. However, the low Cronbach’s alpha value obtained
on the eighth component, revealing a low internal consistency
reliability of this component, prompted the exclusion of
item 10 (one of the two items that made up the eighth
component). The new PCA conducted, excluding only item
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
10 but including all the remaining 31 MAIA items, produced
a structure of a seven-component/factor model as the best fit
(Table 9). The cumulative variance explained by this seven-
factor model in the Indian MAIA was 62.24%. The results of
the rotated component matrix for the Spanish participants also
showed a different component/factor structure compared to the
original English and the Spanish version of the MAIA scale.
These results demonstrated a seven-component/factor model
with considerable differences in the grouping of the items
compared with the original MAIA scale. In addition, the negative
Cronbach’s alpha value obtained in the seventh component
prompted the exclusion of items 6 and 10 that made up this
component. The results of the new PCA, excluding both items
6 and 10, indicated a good fit for a six-factor model (Table 10).
TABLE 1C | Differences in percentages among yoga practitioners on aspects of
yoga practice.
Practitioners
(N=232)
Type of yoga (%) Traditional 84.4%
Modern 11.8%
Both 3.8%
Frequency of practice (%) Once 12.6%
Twice 21.7%
Thrice 15.2%
Four times 9.7%
Five times 16.1%
Six times 10.4%
Everyday 14.3%
Type of practices (%) Asana 8.0%
Pranayama 1.8%
Yogic relaxation 1.3%
Meditation 3.1%
More than one 40.0%
All 45.8%
Lenght of practice (%) Beginners 31.4%
Medium-term 45.8%
Long-term 23.8%
Length of practice—beginners (BG; 1 month to <1 year of practice), medium-term
practitioners (MP; 1–5 years of practice), and long-term practitioners (LP; >5 years of
practice).
The cumulative variance explained by this six-factor model in the
Spanish MAIA was 69.02%.
Low Cronbach’s alphas for the Not-Distracting and Not-
Worrying sub-scales, which include item 6 (I distract myself from
sensations of discomfort) and item 10 (I can notice an unpleasant
body sensation without worrying about it), respectively, have
been reported in several studies of the original English version
and its translations. This was in part explained by their two
characteristics: (1) both scales have reversely scored or “negative”
items and (2) both consist of only three items, and Cronbach’s
alpha is sensitive to the number of items. These subscales have
been improved by the authors in a recent version of MAIA
(Mehling et al., 2018). Nevertheless, the Cronbach’s alpha values
of the full MAIA scale obtained for the total sample (0.91),
the Indian participants (0.89), and Spanish participants (0.93)
were all adequate enough to confirm the internal consistency
reliability of the scale in the total sample and in both the
cultural samples.
The results of the exploratory PCA also showed a different
factor composition in the MAIA scale for the Indian and the
Spanish samples, which have been renamed in Tables 9,10, based
on the grouping of items. The factor composition being different
in the two cultural samples led us to reject the examination of
the underlying skills represented by the MAIA subscales when
considering our first and second hypotheses.
DISCUSSION
The main objective of the study, as elaborated earlier, was
to explain the self-regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga
practice within the S-ART theoretical framework. Apart from
this, the second and one of the empirical objectives of this
study was to analyze the role of yoga practice on the self-
regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga practitioners vs. NP
through the study of psychological variables mapped to the three
S-ART meta-abilities of self-awareness, self-regulation,and self-
transcendence.
In relation to this, the results showed significantly better
self-awareness and self-regulatory abilities in yoga practitioners
(Indian and Spanish combined) than NP (as indicated by the
scores on MAIA and EQ-D, respectively). Thus, the results
obtained were in line with the previous findings, with a new
contribution that this finding was obtained within a culturally
diverse sample. Better self-awareness is reflected in a general
TABLE 2 | Bivariate correlations of the outcome variables with socio-demographic characteristics, life habits and aspects of yoga practice.
Gender Age Nationality Marital Educ. Occup. Weight Height Smoking Alcohol Physical Yoga Practice Type of
status exercise type freq. practices
MAIA −0.05 0.04 −0.07 0.11* 0.09 0.04 0.01 −0.01 −0.09 −0.09 0.20** 0.11 0.14* 0.14*
EQ-D −0.18** 0.07 −0.08 0.09 0.14* −0.00 0.11* 0.10 0.02 −0.07 0.18** 0.12 0.18** 0.11
DERS 0.05 −0.12* −0.06 −0.09 −0.00 0.03 −0.08 −0.07 −0.06 0.05 −0.13* −0.02 −0.02 −0.08
RCS −0.04 0.00 0.07 0.03 0.05 0.02 0.06 0.02 −0.03 0.02 0.12* 0.10 0.05 0.00
**p<0.01; *p<0.05; Educ., Education; Occup., Occupation; Practice Freq., Frequency of practice.
Frontiers in Psychology | www.frontiersin.org 12 July 2021 | Volume 12 | Article 585300
Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
TABLE 3 | Hierarchical regression analysis with perseverance in yoga as the predictor variable in total Multidimensional Assessment of Interoceptive Awareness (MAIA)
and Experiences Questionnaire-Decentering (EQ-D) total scores after controlling sociodemographic characteristics, life habits, and aspects of yoga practice.
MAIA EQ-D
B SE B βtpB SE B βT p
Gender – – – – – −3.267 1.159 −0.233 −2.819 0.005
Education – – – – – −3.374 0.540 −0.055 −0.693 0.489
Marital status 2.105 1.518 0.097 1.387 0.167 – – – – –
Weight – – – – – 0.026 0.042 0.050 0.615 0.540
Physical exercise 5.869 2.280 0.179 2.574 0.011 1.702 0.725 0.174 2.346 0.020
Frequency of practices 1.346 0.745 0.131 1.807 0.072 0.528 0.251 0.167 2.102 0.037
Type of practices 1.099 0.827 0.092 1.329 0.185 – – – – –
Length of practice 6.093 2.040 0.211 2.987 0.003 1.340 0.665 0.149 2.104 0.046
Length of practice (perseverance in yoga) was categorized into three groups of BG (1 month to <1 year of practice), MP (1–5 years of practice), and LP (>5 years of practice).
TABLE 4 | Bivariate correlations of the outcome variables with sociodemographic characteristics, life habits, and aspects of yoga practice in the Indian participants.
Gender Age Marital Education Occupation Weight Height Smoking Alcohol Physical Type of Practice Type of
status exercise yoga frequency practices
MAIA −0.00 0.06 0.06 0.13 −0.08 0.03 0.03 −0.16* −0.08 0.20** 0.05 −0.00 0.15
EQ-D −0.11 0.04 0.04 0.07 −0.13 0.12 0.18* 0.07 −0.05 0.19* 0.07 0.03 0.08
DERS 0.10 −0.06 −0.06 −0.10 0.13 −0.01 0.03 −0.00 0.09 −0.14 0.02 0.012 −0.02
RCS 0.02 0.08 0.08 0.09 0.02 0.12 0.05 −0.05 0.01 0.13 0.08 −0.04 0.07
**p<0.01; *p<0.05.
TABLE 5 | Bivariate correlations of the outcome variables with sociodemographic characteristics, life habits, and aspects of yoga practice in the Spanish participants.
Gender Age Marital Education Occupation Weight Height Smoking Alcohol Physical Type of Practice Type of
status exercise yoga frequency practices
MAIA −0.09 0.03 0.16* −0.09 0.12 −0.00 −0.02 0.08 −0.06 0.20* 0.23* 0.40** 0.13
EQ–D −0.25** 0.06 0.14 0.12 0.09 0.10 0.07 0.23* −0.03 0.17* 0.25* 0.43** 0.14
DERS 0.27** −0.17* −0.11 −0.03 −0.08 −0.18* −0.14 −0.10 0.09 −0.13 −0.15 −0.21* −0.22*
RCS −0.12 −0.12 −0.01 0.05 0.05 −0.03 −0.00 0.03 −0.03 0.12 0.18 0.31** −0.07
**p<0.01; *p<0.05.
higher level of interoceptive awareness in the yoga practitioners
compared to NP. Previous research by Rani and Rao (1994)
demonstrated an increase in awareness of the normal, non-
emotive bodily process through the practice of Hatha Yoga.
The previous studies, in which specific yoga programs were
conducted with chronic pain patients, have also found increases
in body awareness (Tul et al., 2011; Cramer et al., 2013).
In regard to self-regulation, we found a higher decentering
ability in the yoga practitioners compared to NP. Decentering
represents a metacognitive capacity, which includes three
interrelated processes: meta-awareness, de-identification from
internal experience, and reduced reactivity to thought content.
It can be considered as an emotion regulation skill set, which
develops in the process of self-regulation. The development of
this skill set of decentering, arising through mindfulness-based
interventions, is related to a decrease in subjective emotional
reactions and amelioration of distress disorders (King and Fresco,
2019). A previous study by the first author of the current
study, demonstrated improvement in decentering after yoga
practice, along with significant improvements in interoceptive
awareness (measured by MAIA), emotional symptomatology
(anxiety, distress, depression symptoms, and perceived stress),
and perception of happiness and satisfaction with life in a
group of Spanish hypertensive patients, who followed a yoga
intervention, compared with a control group (Tolbaños Roche
et al., 2017).
In relation to the third dimension of self-transcendence, we
did not find significant differences between yoga practitioners
and NP, which was a deviation from the reviewed previous
findings. This may have been due to different conceptualizations
of self-transcendence in the previous studies compared to
ours. We mapped the S-ART dimension of self-transcendence
to multidimensional relational compassion, which included
relationships of self-self, self-other, other-self, and other-other.
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
This dimension of self-transcendence, which includes social
components and possibly social outcomes of yoga practice
such as prosocial behavior, needs more exploration, and related
hypotheses need to be further elaborated in future studies (Gard
et al., 2014).
TABLE 6 | Multiple comparisons between groups based on yoga practice in total
MAIA and EQ-D scores in the Indian participants.
(I) (J) Mean difference (I – J)
MAIATOT NP BG −6.62
AYP −15.73*
BG NP 6.62
AYP −9.11*
AYP NP 15.73*
BG 9.11*
EQTOT NP BG −2.75
AYP −4.17*
BG NP 2.75
AYP −1.42
AYP NP 4.17*
BG 1.42
*p<0.05, NP, Non-practitioners; BG, Beginners; AYP, Above 1-year practitioners.
Regarding our second objective, aimed at further studying
how perseverance in yoga (long-term yoga practice) influenced
these self-regulatory mechanisms, our results demonstrated that
perseverance in yoga practice acted as a significant predictor of
interoceptive awareness, a vital aspect of self-awareness, and self-
regulatory abilities, in the yoga practitioners of the current study.
Providing additional support to our results in this regard, the
study of Villemure et al. (2013) showed that regular and long-
term yoga practice improved pain tolerance in a North American
sample by using cognitive strategies involving parasympathetic
activation and interoceptive awareness to tolerate pain. In
addition, a study with breast cancer survivors recruited from
three comprehensive cancer care centers in Bengaluru, India,
reported that participants with more than 6 months of regular
yoga practice during the prior year of the intervention had better
psychological profiles and were able to deal with demanding
situations better than those who had attended <3 yoga sessions
during the previous year (Amritanshu et al., 2017).
In relation to the third study objective of exploring the
contribution of yoga practice in each cultural sample, the Indian
and Spanish samples demonstrated interestingly divergent
findings. The results showed that the practice of yoga and
perseverance in it acted as a significant predictor of the
abilities of interoceptive awareness and decentering in the Indian
practitioners, who had more than 1 year of yoga practice, but not
in Spanish practitioners. For the Spanish participants, physical
TABLE 7 | Hierarchical regression analysis with practice of yoga and perseverance in it as the predictor variable in total MAIA and EQ-D scores of the Indian participants
after controlling sociodemographic characteristics, life habits, and aspects of yoga practice.
MAIA EQ-D
B SE B βtpB SE B βtp
Smoking −15.719 6.836 −0.168 −2.300 0.023 – – – – –
Height – – – – – 0.132 0.047 0.209 2.808 0.006
Physical exercise 3.484 1.962 0.134 1.174 0.078 1.557 0.605 0.198 2.575 0.011
Practice/length of yoga 6.883 1.889 0.275 3.644 <0.001 1.523 0.572 0.205 2.663 0.009
Practice/length of yoga (yoga practice and perseverance in it) was categorized into three groups of NP (never or <1month of yoga practice), BG (1 month to <1 year of practice), and
AYP (>1 year of practice).
TABLE 8 | Hierarchical regression analysis with practice of yoga and perseverance in it as the predictor variable in total MAIA and EQ-D scores of the Spanish participants
after controlling sociodemographic characteristics, life habits, and aspects of yoga practice.
MAIA EQ-D
B SE B βtpB SE B βtP
Gender – – – – – 0.990 3.317 0.049 0.298 0.767
Marital status 2.320 1.913 0.122 1.213 0.229 – – – – –
Smoking – – – – – −1.520 3.154 −0.085 −0.482 0.633
Physical exercise 9.376 4.319 0.226 2.171 0.033 1.215 1.820 0.113 0.668 0.509
Type of yoga −0.922 7.039 −0.014 −0.131 0.896 0.787 3.926 0.032 0.200 0.842
Frequency of practices 4.281 1.494 0.298 2.864 0.005 1.343 1.056 0.205 1.271 0.213
Practice/length of yoga 7.591 4.425 0.175 1.716 0.090 1.951 1.495 0.243 1.306 0.201
Practice/length of yoga (yoga practice and perseverance in it) was categorized into three groups of NP (never or <1 month of yoga practice), BG (1 month to <1 year of practice), and
AYP (>1 year of practice).
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
TABLE 9 | Exploratory PCA of the MAIA items in Indian participants.
FL C
I.Attention Regulation α=0.867
11—I can pay attention to my breath without being distracted by things happening around me. 0.705 0.562
12—I can maintain awareness of my inner bodily sensations even when there is a lot going on around me. 0.568 0.513
13—When I am in conversation with someone, I can pay attention to my posture. 0.645 0.537
14—I can return awareness to my body if I am distracted. 0.732 0.653
15—I can refocus my attention from thinking to sensing my body. 0.754 0.684
16—I can maintain awareness of my whole body even when a part of me is in pain or discomfort. 0.702 0.641
17—I am able to consciously focus on my body as a whole. 0.595 0.630
II.Emotional Awareness and Self-Regulation α=0.756
4—I notice changes in my breathing, such as whether it slows down or speeds up. 0.428 0.521
19—When something is wrong in my life I can feel it in my body. 0.444 0.486
20—I notice that my body feels different after a peaceful experience. 0.721 0.578
21—I notice that my breathing becomes free and easy when I feel comfortable. 0.780 0.665
22—I notice how my body changes when I feel happy / joyful. 0.776 0.692
23—When I feel overwhelmed I can find a calm place inside. 0.550 0.386
24—When I bring awareness to my body I feel a sense of calm. 0.578 0.521
III.Body Listening and Self-Regulation α=0.833
18—I notice how my body changes when I am angry. 0.430 0.476
25—I can use my breath to reduce tension. 0.597 0.645
26—When I am caught up in thoughts, I can calm my mind by focusing on my body/breathing. 0.696 0.760
27—I listen for information from my body about my emotional state. 0.633 0.653
28—When I am upset, I take time to explore how my body feels. 0.742 0.601
29—I listen to my body to inform me about what to do. 0.566 0.652
IV.Trusting α=0.836
30—I am at home in my body. 0.778 0.691
31—I feel my body is a safe place. 0.808 0.802
32—I trust my body sensations. 0.756 0.748
V.Noticing_I α=0.715
1—I notice where in my body I am comfortable. 0.661 0.627
2—When I am tense I notice where the tension is located in my body. 0.813 0.725
3—I notice when I am uncomfortable in my body. 0.749 0.676
VI.Not-Worrying_I α=0.639
8—When I feel physical pain, I become upset. 0.770 0.629
9—I start to worry that something is wrong if I feel any discomfort. 0.809 0.676
VII.Not-Distracting α=0.611
5—I do not notice (I ignore) physical tension or discomfort until they become more severe. 0.753 0.602
6—I distract myself from sensations of discomfort. 0.769 0.659
7—When I feel pain or discomfort, I try to power through it. 0.689 0.602
exercise and frequency of yoga practice acted as better predictors
of the abilities of interoceptive awareness (self-awareness) and
decentering (self-regulation) than yoga practice and perseverance
in it. Although our culturally diverse sample of yoga practitioners
vs. NP was not as methodologically rigorous as it should have
been, our findings do provide some form of reaffirmation
to findings from cultural psychological research cited earlier
on in the “Introduction” section, and signal to the need for
future studies to take up culture as an important variable when
conducting research with the culturally rooted practice of yoga.
Furthermore, the different factor composition in the MAIA scale
for the Indian and the Spanish samples showed in the exploratory
PCA gives some evidence for cultural differences in psychological
phenomena, which would be worth exploring in future research.
The obtained findings support the proposition made by the
current researchers in the “Introduction” section to consider
the S-ART model as a theoretical framework to explain the
self-regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga practice. Yoga
practitioners, in the current study, have shown a higher level of
self-awareness and self-regulation compared to NP. The ability
to be aware of one’s own body’s feelings and sensations and
their relationships with emotions and thoughts may be the
main mechanism in regulating unpleasant feelings, disturbances,
and distress in the yoga practitioners. The yoga practitioners
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
TABLE 10 | Exploratory PCA of the MAIA items in Spanish participants.
FL C
I. Attention Regulation_S α=0.916
11—I can pay attention to my breath without being distracted by things happening around me. 0.768 0.721
12—I can maintain awareness of my inner bodily sensations even when there is a lot going on around me. 0.762 0.696
13—When I am in conversation with someone, I can pay attention to my posture. 0.737 0.636
14—I can return awareness to my body if I am distracted. 0.785 0.687
15—I can refocus my attention from thinking to sensing my body. 0.705 0.731
16—I can maintain awareness of my whole body even when a part of me is in pain or discomfort. 0.627 0.667
17—I am able to consciously focus on my body as a whole. 0.582 0.715
27—I listen for information from my body about my emotional state. 0.512 0.752
II. Body Listening, Trusting and Self-Regulation α=0.933
3—I notice when I am uncomfortable in my body. 0.442 0.469
23—When I feel overwhelmed I can find a calm place inside. 0.645 0.600
24—When I bring awareness to my body I feel a sense of calm. 0.613 0.713
25—I can use my breath to reduce tension. 0.537 0.614
26—When I am caught up in thoughts, I can calm my mind by focusing on my body/breathing. 0.638 0.730
28—When I am upset, I take time to explore how my body feels. 0.584 0.780
29—I listen to my body to inform me about what to do. 0.588 0.805
30—I am at home in my body. 0.816 0.853
31—I feel my body is a safe place. 0.784 0.845
32—I trust my body sensations. 0.700 0.763
III. Emotional Awareness_S α=0.852
4—I notice changes in my breathing, such as whether it slows down or speeds up. 0.373 0.370
18—I notice how my body changes when I am angry. 0.565 0.690
19—When something is wrong in my life, I can feel it in my body. 0.643 0.736
20—I notice that my body feels different after a peaceful experience. 0.757 0.702
21—I notice that my breathing becomes free and easy when I feel comfortable. 0.763 0.798
22—I notice how my body changes when I feel happy / joyful. 0.765 0.740
IV. Noticing_S α=0.727
1—I notice where in my body I am comfortable. 0.808 0.739
2—When I am tense I notice where the tension is located in my body. 0.786 0.691
V. Not_Worrying_S α=0.542
8—When I feel physical pain, I become upset. 0.777 0.646
9—I start to worry that something is wrong if I feel any discomfort. 0.675 0.546
VI. Not_Distracting_S α=0.547
5—I do not notice (I ignore) physical tension or discomfort until they become more severe. 0.758 0.633
7—When I feel pain or discomfort, I try to power through it. 0.779 0.639
FL, Factor loadings; C, Communalities; α=Cronbach’s alpha.
have also shown a higher decentering or non-attachment
ability, one of the six neurocognitive mechanisms underlying
the mindfulness process according to the S-ART model. The
decentering attitude facilitates a greater willingness to experience
negative emotions, that is, a greater tolerance of unwanted
emotional states without deliberately trying to control them,
consequently reducing emotional reactivity (Britton et al., 2012).
Observing and accepting the emotions without trying to control
emotional states should facilitate effective emotion regulation
(Heppner et al., 2015). Thus, the leap forward from a control
mode to one of acceptance, in which the present experience is
accepted as a transitory experience, can be considered as a process
of self-regulation in itself.
Although no significant differences between yoga
practitioners and NP in self-transcendence (measured by
the RCS) were found, the authors are of the opinion that this
S-ART ability has more potential to emerge as a result of the
uninterrupted and thoroughly committed practice of yoga,
Therefore, self-transcendence could be probed further in future
research with devoted long-term yoga practitioners.
Despite the novel application of the S-ART framework to
yoga and the generation of testable hypotheses, the findings
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Tolbaños-Roche and Menon S-ART, Yoga and Self-Regulatory Action
from the current study cannot be generalized due to non-
random selection of targeted participants, non-equal selection
of yoga practitioners and NP in the cross-cultural sample, and
the use of self-reported measurements. Future research could
use a more rigorous sampling method, and brain mapping
and neurophysiological task-oriented measures when testing the
hypotheses generated in the current study. It would be interesting
if future studies could explore how the three S-ART meta-abilities
in yoga practitioners with an advanced level of commitment
not only just to the practices but also to following a completely
yogic lifestyle.
CONCLUSION
In the current study, applying the S-ART theoretical framework
and model to yoga enabled the generation of testable hypotheses
and further provided preliminary empirical evidence to explain
the self-regulatory mechanisms of action in yoga practice in two
contextually different cultures. Thus, the S-ART could potentially
serve as an overarching theoretical framework in yoga similar to
mindfulness research, and therefore, merits in-depth exploration
in yoga research in the future.
DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT
The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be
made available by the authors, without undue reservation.
ETHICS STATEMENT
Ethical review and approval was not required for the study on
human participants in accordance with the local legislation and
institutional requirements. The patients/participants provided
their written informed consent to participate in this study.
AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONS
LT-R and PM contributed to the conception and design of the
study, collected the data and wrote sections of the manuscript.
PM organized the database. LT-R performed the statistical
analysis and interpretation of data. LT-R wrote the first draft of
the manuscript. Both authors contributed to manuscript revision,
and read and approved the submitted version.
FUNDING
LT-R received institutional travel grants from the Universidad de
La Laguna, San Cristóbal de La Laguna, Spain, to visit India for
this collaborative study. PM received institutional research grants
from Kaivalayadhama Yoga Institute, Lonavala, India, for local
travel, data collection and for publishing this study.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors gratefully acknowledge the contribution of
Kaivalyadhama Yoga Institute and its staff members for their
financial, administrative, and academic support with the project,
especially Shri Subodh Tiwari, Prof. R.S. Bhogal and Mrs.
Akshata Badave, as well as the academic and administrative
support of the University of La Laguna, especially Dr. María
Teresa Miró Barrachina for her invaluable academic guidance.
The authors also express their deepest gratitude to Swami
Maheshananda, the spiritual head of Kaivalyadhama, for his ever
present moral support.
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