Although it might appear that meditation holds a place in mainstream society, its precise role and the benefits it can bring are very much a subject of academic debate. Western science, particularly psychology, is struggling to establish a coherent definition of meditation which can be used to create a theoretical framework within which meditation might be fully understood. In plain speaking meditation is not always defined reliably, what its components are and how it works is subject to a degree of interpretation. One of the strengths of experimental psychology is replication, when the results of an experiment are repeated by different scientists at different times then the results tend to be viewed more favorably. Because of a lack of consistent definitions, satisfactory replication is big issue in meditation research.
This is not a criticism of meditation. I have seen and experienced the benefits of meditation over many years. But I would like to see significant reforms in the way meditation is researched. The Science of Meditation is a website that highlights and reviews some of the latest research into meditation. Recent blog entries include studies investigating the effectiveness of meditation in a clinical setting as well as workable definitions of the term mindfulness.