• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.89-105
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• 2014

This study investigated the effects of a brief Loving-Kindness and Compassion Meditation(20 minutes) on compassionate love and altruism of undergraduate students. Among the 187 students who were completed the KIIP-SC, 35 of high scored students in Interpersonal Problem Scale were randomly assigned to one of two different groups: Loving-Kindness and Compassion Meditation group(LCM, n=19) and Imagery Trainning group(IT, n=16). During the 20 minutes of practice, LCM group was asked to practice loving-kindness and compassion meditation and IT group was asked to investigate personal characteristics of the imagined people who were same as LCM. Compassionate love, four immeasurebles, two kind of altruistic behaviors, and mood states were measured pre- and post-treatment. LCM group showed significantly higher incremental scores for compassionate love, donation for strange person, and helping behaviors for friends, for close person, and for stranger than IT group. Negative and positive mood states were improved for each of the groups, but there was no significant differences between groups. The results suggested that the comparatively short practice of loving-kindness and compassion meditation could increase altruistic attitudes and intentions toward other persons. And, these effects could not be attributed to mood effects. Limitations of this study and the directions of further research were discussed.