Genji Sugamura is Professor of psychology at Kansai University, Osaka, Japan. He is a charter board member of the Japanese Association of Mindfulness, and the Japanese Society for Mi no Iryo (medicine of a somato-psycho-social-spiritual unity). He specializes in embodiment issues in theoretical and scientific contexts. He has been trying to incorporate the East Asian philosophy into Western psychological science especially in terms of Buddhism, Taoism, and Shintoism. He has been conducting a series of experiments on the effects of physical postures, breathing, vocal behaviors, and other body movements on mood, motivation, and cognition. His recent interest is in how the Japanese traditional somatic education can be incorporated as a possible way to enhance attention and empathy for elementary students. His research group has developed the school-use chair, specifically designed to support Zazen-like upright posture. Curiously, this chair made students feel very relaxed and yet lively, regardless of students’ grade level, whereas the conventional chair made their mood neither positive nor negative. These findings suggest the potential of self-regulation training through physical posture by simply using redesigned chairs. He is now combining this postural approach with mindfulness training for the college students with neurodevelopmental disorder. On such topics, he has published almost 70 book chapters and journal articles, and made more than 150 conference presentations.
