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Overall, massage is effective.
A recent analysis of 37 massage therapy studies showed that
massage has a significant overall effect on people, specifficaly in
the reduction of state anxiety, blood pressure, heart rate, trait
anxiety, depression and pain.
"A Meta-Analysis of Massage Therapy Research" was conducted by
staff at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Department
of Educational Psycology.
Studies that were included in the analysis had to meet a number
of criteria, such as the use of a bodywork modality consistent with
the definition of massage as "the manual manipulation of soft
tissue to promote health and well-being."
Each study also had to compare a massage-therapy group with
one or more non-massage control groups; use random group
assignment; and report enough data for "a between-groups effect
size to be generated on at least one dependent variable of
interest," state the study's authors.
The 37 studies selected for the analysis used a total of 1802
participants. Of these 795 received massage therapy and 1007
received a comparison treatment.
Researchers looked at nine dependent outcome variables among
the studies, to see if the results would show consistent
improvement with massage therapy.
The single-dose (short-term) outcomes analyzed were state
anxiety, negative mood, pain assessed immediately after massage,
heart rate, blood pressure and cortisol levels. The multiple-dose
(long-term) effects analyzed were trait anxiety, depression and
delayed assessment of pain.
State anxiety is temporary and situation-specific, while trait
anxiety is the innate tendency to be anxious.
The mean result of 37 studies showed significant reduction in state
anxiety, high blood pressure, heart rate, trait anxiety, depression
and delayed assessment of pain.
"This meta-analysis supports the general conclusion that massage
therapy is effective, 37 studies yielded a statistically significant
overall effect as well as six specific out of nine that were
examined", state the study's authors.
Mean results for negative mood, immediate assessment of pain
and cortisol were not significant.
Massage therapy's most powerful effects, according to the
combined results of the studies, were reduction of trait anxiety
and depression.
"The average massage therapy participant experienced a
reduction of trait anxiety that was greater than 77% of
comparison group participants and a reduction of depression that
was greater than 73% of comparison group participants", state
the study's authors.
"Considered together, these results indicate that massage therapy
may have an effect similar to psychotherapy."
The authors suggest further research into wether massge therapy
is as effective as psychotherapy, and wether a combination of
the two is more effective than either one alone.
Source: University of illinois at Urbana-Champaign department of Educational
Psychology.
Authors: Christopher A Moyer, James Rounds and James W. Hannum.
Originally published in Psychological Bulletin 2004, Vol. 130, No. 1, pp 3-18.
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