Yoga and Cognitive Behaviour Techniques for Academic Stress and Mental Wellbeing among School Students.

ABSTRACT

There are many stressors acting upon school children. Today in the era of increasing competitiveness,a child is overloaded with daily living stresses, and he lives a tight rope existence trying to cope up with the tremendous pressures from all institutions, whether it is school, family or society. These are resulting in various stress related ailments and psychological problems, which poses threat and challenges for the physical as well as mental wellbeing of the school going children. The present work was an attempt to measure one of the major source of stress,i.e. academic stress and mental wellbeing of a sample of school children and then to provide an intervention plan for a selected group of students who are having high academic stress and poor mental wellbeing. Certain specific Asanas, Mudras and Pranayams of Yoga were combined with some specific techniques of Cognitive Behaviour therapy (C.B.T.) to reduce the academic stress and to enhance the mental wellbeing of the selected group of school children. The results have shown a significant relief from academic stress and significant improvement in the mental wellbeing of these children. Detailed methodology and results are discussed in this paper. This paper highlights the efficacy of Yoga in combination with certain techniques of C.B.T. in enhancing overall wellbeing of school children.