Development and validation of humming process to increase heart rate variability & attention for college students

Aim: The objective of the study was to compare the impact of daily 10 min humming practice for one week on heart-brain coherence and attention on college students. Methodology: The evidence indicates that increased heart-brain coherence facilitates better emotional regulation and thereby increases attention. Simple humming practice was identified as a method to increase the heart-brain coherence. Each student was assigned randomly to an experimental group or control group. The experimental group (n= 15) performed 10-minutes humming daily for 7 days and the control group (n=15) was not asked to do anything. 10-minute humming was simplified Bhramari practice with total breath duration of 13 seconds based on short training. SDMT (Symbol Digit Modalities Test) and Heart Brain Coherence (using Emwave Pro Device by HeartMath Inc.) was conducted for both the groups on Day 1 and Day 7. Statistical analysis was conducted using student-t test to understand the results. Results: For the experimental group, there was statistically significant improvement in both “Coherence” and “SDMT” score on Day 7 (compared to Day 1, p<.05). For control group, the change in both parameters was not statistically significant. Conclusions: The results confirm that a short duration humming practice just for one week can increase the heart-brain coherence and Heart Rate Variability and has a significant impact on increasing attention amongst the college students. These findings can be leveraged to facilitate better concentration and potentially increased performance for college students.