302 • PART iii: YogA foR EduCATing foR SElf-REgulATion And EngAgEMEnT
my team and many other teams are committed to making this research happen. It will take
teamwork between research and school personnel. Considering the wonderful researchers
and school personnel I know, I think we are up to the task (and it’s a big one). Here is a list
of questions that have yet to be answered.
- Can you really compare Ashtanga, Vinyasa, Kriplau, and Hatha yoga? How are these
yoga practices the same? How are they different? What are the yoga ingredients that cre-
ate change? Do all types of yoga share these ingredients? - What type of yoga is best for each age? Does it matter? Should we use animal and plant
names for kids or is it okay to say Warrior I? Do we need to tell a story, play games, sing
songs, or can we just do yoga? - How much does a research design that uses physical education as the active control group
really tell us about the effects of yoga? Are activities conducted in physical education
adequately commensurate with yoga? - What is the best active control group to answer our questions?
- Should all yoga studies be analyzed by gender and age?
- How much does teacher buy-in matter?
- Who teaches better yoga in schools, school-personnel trained as yoga teachers or yoga
teachers trained to teach in schools? - How much does experience with behavioral management matter?
- Does the yoga practice experience of the teacher matter? What if the teacher doesn’t
practice? - What is the best way to document the yoga being done in the study? Should we require a
manual? Should the manual be somewhat flexible to allow for in-the-moment adaptations? - Are the programs being implemented with fidelity?
- Should all studies report and control for attendance and participation? Should the level of
student engagement in the program be measured (i.e., enthusiastic participation, passive
engagement, or active resistance)? - How are programs adapted for students with special needs? Does this change the integ-
rity measures or manualization? Should this be controlled for? - Are the samples used in research studies diverse enough?
- What is optimal dosage of yoga? How much does home practice matter? Does it matter
if students keep practicing after the intervention or do the effects hold without practice? - Are all students yoga naïve? Are they mind-body practice naïve? Or do they do other
mind-body practices? What if you have four students who are Ti Kwon Do champions in
your control group? What about mindful dance? - Is continued practice necessary for long-term effect?
- How can we compare across studies when studies are not standardized or manualized?
Can we standardize and manualize yoga?
YogA PRogRAM ConTEnT
There is a growing number of yoga programs available for your school. To gather the available
information, I combined the work of members of my research team with the resources avail-
able in published articles and through an independent search of databases and Google.
First, Heather Cahill, Killian Cherry, and Rebecca Sivecz of my research team spent an entire