Reduce Anxiety with Mindful but not Non-Mindful Exercises
By John M. de Castro, Ph.D.
“Yoga brings together physical and mental disciplines that may help you achieve peacefulness of body and mind. This can help you relax and manage stress and anxiety.” – Mayo Clinic
Anxiety at low levels is normal and can act to signal potential future danger. But when it is overwhelming it creates what we label as anxiety disorders. They are the most common mental illness in the United States, affecting 40 million adults, or 18% of the population. It has been estimated that one out of every three absences at work are caused by high levels of anxiety. Also, it has been found to be the most common reason for chronic school absenteeism. In addition, people with high levels of anxiety are three-to-five times more likely to go to the doctor and six times more likely to be hospitalized for psychiatric disorders than non-sufferers, making it a major burden on the healthcare system.
Anxiety has generally been treated with drugs. But there are considerable side effects and these drugs are often abused. There are a number of psychological therapies for anxiety. But, about 45% of the patients treated do not respond to the therapy. So, there is a need to develop alternative treatments. Recently, it has been found that mindfulness improves the regulation of all emotions, including negative emotions like anxiety. There are a large variety of mindfulness practices. There have been a number of studies examining the effectiveness of mindfulness practices on anxiety. It’s important to take a look at what has been learned.
In today’s Research News article “Comparing Mindful and Non-Mindful Exercises on Alleviating Anxiety Symptoms: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.” (See summary below or view the full text of the study at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7700675/ ) So and colleagues review, summarize, and perform a meta-analysis of the published randomized controlled trials of mindful and non-mindful practices for the treatment of non-specific anxiety.
They identified 14 published studies. The mindful practices consisted of yoga (10 studies) and qigong (4 studies) while the non-mindful practices consisted of walking, aerobic exercise, and stretching. They report that the published studies found that yoga practice produced a significant reduction in anxiety compared to non-mindful exercises while qigong practice did not.
Mindfulness practices have been routinely found to reduce anxiety in numerous other research studies. So, these results are not surprising. But yoga is both a mindfulness practice and an exercise. So, finding it effective while other non-mindful exercises were not, suggests that it is the mindfulness practice that is the key to yoga’s ability to reduce anxiety. The fact that qigong practice was not effective is surprising. The authors note that yoga but not qigong empathises breath control and speculate that this may be the critical difference explaining their differential effectiveness.
So, reduce anxiety with mindful but not non-mindful exercises.
“Yoga for stress and anxiety helps to release deep holding patterns in the body and generates a state of balance to support healing.” – Melissa Mercedes
CMCS – Center for Mindfulness and Contemplative Studies
This and other Contemplative Studies posts are also available on Google+ https://plus.google.com/106784388191201299496/posts and on Twitter @MindfulResearch
Study Summary
So, W., Lu, E. Y., Cheung, W. M., & Tsang, H. (2020). Comparing Mindful and Non-Mindful Exercises on Alleviating Anxiety Symptoms: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. International journal of environmental research and public health, 17(22), 8692. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17228692
Abstract
Background: In recent years, studies and reviews have reported the therapeutic benefits of both mindful and non-mindful exercises in reducing anxiety. However, there have not been any systematic reviews to compare their relative effectiveness for therapeutic application, especially among the non-clinical population. Thus, the aim of this review is to compare the effectiveness between mindful and non-mindful exercise on treating anxiety among non-clinical samples. Methods: Potential articles were retrieved from PubMed, Embase, Academic Search Premier, and PsycInfo. Randomized controlled trials, which involved both mindful and non-mindful exercises as intervention, and the use of anxiety outcome measures were included. Results: Twenty-four studies fulfilled the inclusion criteria and were included in our systematic review. In addition, 14 studies provided sufficient data to be included in the meta-analysis. For studies that reported significant group differences at post-assessment, results showed that mindful exercise was more beneficial in reducing anxiety than non-mindful exercise. The meta-analysis reported that yoga was more effective in reducing anxiety than non-mindful exercise. Conclusions: Compared to non-mindful exercise, yoga is shown to be more effective in alleviating anxiety symptoms. It is recommended that yoga could be used as a primary healthcare intervention to help the public reduce anxiety.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7700675/