Recent research published in Neuroscience Annual Report It has been suggested that practicing certain types of sound-based meditation can quiet electrical activity in the brain while increasing alertness. These findings provide evidence that listening to and focusing on rhythmic sounds can induce unique mental states. This state is characterized by deep physical relaxation and sharp mental clarity.
Rhythmic sound meditation is a structured practice that involves focusing attention on specific, repetitive auditory cues. In this particular study, participants focused on the audio syllable “AUM.” In guided practice, a person’s attention is instructed to gradually shift from hearing external sounds to experiencing a state of internal silence. Historically, this technique is known as Nadamai meditation and has its roots in ancient Indian philosophical texts.
Researchers designed the study to understand how this particular type of auditory meditation affects brain function. Most previous studies on mindfulness practices tend to show increases in specific brain waves associated with relaxation and concentration. However, some practices aimed at achieving a state of mental emptiness tend to have the opposite effect. These techniques often result in a general decrease in electrical activity throughout the brain.
Scientists wanted to precisely map the brain patterns produced by rhythmic sound meditation to see which category it fell into. They wanted to determine whether focusing on rhythmic sounds quieted the brain’s electrical signals or amplified them. They also wanted to track whether changes in brain activity directly influenced how awake and conscious participants felt after the session.
“The primary motivation was to address a notable gap in the neuroscience literature. Meditation research has grown significantly over the past two decades, but the majority of research has focused on quiet, mindfulness-based practices, such as focused attention and open monitoring meditation. Despite having deep historical roots, the tradition of structured sound-based meditation remains largely unexplored from a neurophysiological perspective,” says study author Km, a PhD student at Rajasthan Central University. Megha said.
“The practice of rhythmic sound meditation that we investigated has its roots in Nada Yoga, an ancient Indian tradition described in classical texts such as the Nada Bindu Upanishad, which outlines that sound is a pathway to altered states of consciousness. Using modern EEG methods, we wanted to investigate whether there was a measurable neurophysiological correlate to these experiential claims.”
The researchers recruited 15 healthy adults with an average age of about 25 years. None of the participants had any previous experience with meditation or similar mindfulness practices. Each person participated in two separate 26-minute sessions on different days. One session involves a sound meditation and the other a resting state.
During the meditation session, participants practiced guided rhythmic sound techniques while keeping their eyes closed. During a rest session, simply sit in your chair with your eyes closed and let your thoughts flow naturally. The scientists randomized the order of these visits so that some participants meditated first and others completed the rest phase first.
Before and after each session, participants rated their current level of alertness using a standard questionnaire called the Stanford Sleepiness Scale. The study asks individuals to rank how alert or tired they feel at any given moment. Throughout the 26 minutes of both sessions, the researchers continuously monitored the participants’ brain activity. They used electroencephalography. This is a device that records the brain’s electrical waves through 64 sensors placed harmlessly on the scalp.
The device measures different types of brain waves that vibrate at different speeds and indicate different mental states. These include slow rhythms such as delta and theta waves, which typically appear during sleep, deep relaxation, or daydreaming. Brain waves also track faster rhythms such as alpha, beta, and gamma waves. These faster waves are typically associated with active thinking, problem solving, sensory processing, and deep concentration.
Scientists found that rhythmic sound meditation reduced the power of all five types of brain waves compared to rest. This decrease was most pronounced in the anterior and central regions of the brain. The frontal lobe is an area of the brain deeply involved in attention, planning, and self-awareness. The reduction in activity here suggests that participants had less mind-wandering and distracting thoughts.
At the same time, self-report surveys revealed opposite patterns regarding participants’ arousal states. Approximately 93% of participants felt alert before the rest session. After resting, that number dropped to about 73%, indicating that people felt drowsy when they sat quietly.
In contrast, approximately 87% of participants felt alert before the meditation session began. In fact, after completing the meditation, this number increased to over 93%. The researchers noted that this combination of quiet brain activity and high alertness is highly unusual. A widespread drop in brainwave output usually means a person is falling asleep or losing concentration.
“Perhaps the most shocking finding is what we call the ‘awakening paradox,'” Mega told SciPost. “Traditionally, widespread brain wave output suppression has been associated with drowsiness and cognitive decline. Although we expected some output reduction, 93.3% of meditation participants reported increased alertness after the session, compared to only 73.3% after a resting state. It was particularly unexpected that physical arousal also increased at the same time. This dissociation between vibrational suppression and conscious arousal suggests that rhythmic sound meditation may induce an active and attentive state of the mind, rather than passive relaxation. ”
“The key point is that not all forms of meditation work the same way in the brain. Our findings suggest that rhythmic sound meditation produces a unique state, a state characterized by a reduction in oscillatory brain activity, particularly in frontal regions, while simultaneously increasing subjective arousal. In layman’s terms, participants’ brains became visibly quieter, but they felt more alert and mentally clear afterwards. This combination is far different from mere rest or relaxation, and represents a unique neurological condition that deserves further scientific attention.”
As with all research, there are limitations that should be considered. This study was based on a very small sample size of only 15 people. This means that the results may not be universally applicable to the general population. Scientists note that larger studies with more diverse groups of people are needed to confirm these initial patterns.
Another limitation is that this study used a self-report questionnaire rather than an objective cognitive test to measure attention. Relying entirely on participants’ moods may lead to biased results. Participants may expect to feel better or wake up just because they know they are meditating. Future studies should include physical behavioral tasks, such as computerized reaction time tests, to verify whether participants are actually more alert.
The study also lacked active control conditions, such as having participants listen to podcasts or classical music. This makes it difficult to completely separate the specific effects of meditation from general relaxation. Finally, the surface-level brain sensors used in this study cannot pinpoint which deep brain networks are involved in the process. Advanced imaging techniques are needed to look deeper into the brain and map the specific neural pathways affected by rhythmic sounds.
“We plan to extend this line of research in several directions: replicating the study with a larger and more demographically diverse sample, comparing neurophysiological effects in long-term practitioners and novices, and exploring the potential for clinical applications of rhythmic sound meditation for conditions such as chronic stress, anxiety, and sleep disorders,” Megha explained. “We are also interested in investigating how specific acoustic properties – rhythm, frequency, and sound structure – map onto different brainwave signals.”
Ultimately, the research team hopes these preliminary results will help clarify how physical relaxation and mental focus can coexist. They caution against the assumption that reduced electrical energy in the brain equals reduced consciousness.
“I would like to emphasize that a decrease in brain wave output does not mean a decline in cognitive function,” Mega told PsyPost. “Popular science communication tends to equate ‘brain activity’ with cognitive ability or mental effort. In this context, the suppression of frontal power that we observed is more consistent with what some researchers describe as ‘neural efficiency,’ or a state of reduced self-referential processing, a state of systematic quieting of the mind rather than withdrawal from the mind.”
“We hope that this study will contribute to broader scientific recognition that the sound-based meditation tradition represents a rich and unexplored area in neuroscience research. The practice examined here is part of a centuries-old living meditation tradition, and bringing it into the laboratory is as much an act of cross-cultural scientific dialogue as it is an empirical investigation.”
“I would also like to note that this practice is more fully known as ‘Nadamay meditation’, a name that better reflects its philosophical and sonic underpinnings,” Megha added. “We used the term rhythmic sound meditation in our study for clarity and accessibility within the scientific literature.”
The study, “Sound-based meditation alters brain activity: EEG evidence for power reduction and enhanced conscious arousal,” was authored by Km Megha, Ankita Mishra, Raksha Sharma, Pallabi Pal, Vijay Shanker Yadav, Arjun Ram Roja, Arun Sasidharan, Gulshan Kumar, and Sanjib Patra.
