Effectiveness of negative-thought-reduction, meditation and placebo training treatment in reducing anger

Twenty-nine highly angry subjects who obtained high scores on Spielberger's Trait component of State-Trait Anger Scale went through a thought-listing procedure to determine their negative self-statements in response to high, medium, and low anger-arousing situations. It was found that subjects made more negative self-statements in response to a high anger-arousing situation compared to the medium and low anger-arousing situations. The subjects were divided into four groups. Subjects in one group were trained to reduce their negative thoughts, subjects in a second group were trained to meditate, subjects in the third group were asked to imagine the high anger-arousing situations (placebo procedure), and subjects in the fourth group were given no treatment. It was found that the subjects in the Negative-thought-reduction, Meditation and Placebo groups showed improvement in trait anger, anger aroused through high-anger situations, anger scores across a wide variety of situations, unconstructive coping, and anger measured through physiological symptoms. The gains made through intervention were maintained at a 6-week follow-up. The No-treatment Group showed no significant change in anger scores across a wide variety of situations, unconstructive coping, and physiological symptom scores but showed a small but significant improvement in trait anger and in anger aroused by high-anger situations.