Twenty participants (9 female and 11 male) were recruited voluntarily as they applied for a place on their first 10-day meditation course at Dhamma Aloka Vipassana Meditation Centre in Woori Yallock, Victoria. They consisted of 11 men and 9 women, aged 21 to 57 years (M = 33.70, SD = 12.34). Active (opt-in) recruitment procedures were used, whereby people applying for a place one of the four 10-day courses which ran during the data collection period (15/6/2004 to 15/9/2004) were sent, on behalf of the investigators, by Dhamma Aloka, a letter of introduction outlining the current study (Appendix A), as well as a consent form (Appendix B) which was to be returned (in a supplied reply-paid envelope) should they wish to participate . A further twenty controls were recruited from waiting lists for these same 10-day courses (n = 5) and from the wider community (n = 15). They consisted of 9 men and 11 women, aged 22 to 63 years (M = 31.9, SD = 10.25). There was no significant difference between the groups in terms of age (t(38) = .50, p = .62), gender (X2[1,1] = .40, p = .527), or education (t(38) = -1.21, p = .24). All were native English speakers and had normal or corrected-to-normal eyesight.