Muscle relaxation therapy for anxiety disorders: It works but how?

被引:125
作者
Conrad, Ansgar
Roth, Walton T.
机构
[1] Dept VA Palo Alto Hlth Care Syst, Palo Alto, CA 94304 USA
[2] Stanford Univ, Dept Psychiat & Behav Sci, Stanford, CA 94305 USA
基金
美国国家卫生研究院;
关键词
muscle relaxation; psychophysiology; anxiety; generalized anxiety disorder; panic disorder; EMG;
D O I
10.1016/j.janxdis.2006.08.001
中图分类号
B849 [应用心理学];
学科分类号
040203 ;
摘要
Muscle relaxation therapy (MRT) has continued to play an important role in the modern treatment of anxiety disorders. Abbreviations of the original progressive MRT protocol [Jacobson, E. (1938). Progressive relaxation (2nd ed.). Chicago: University of Chicago Press] have been found to be effective in panic disorder (PD) and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). This review describes the most common MRT techniques, summarizes recent evidence of their effectiveness in treating anxiety, and explains their rationale and physiological basis. We conclude that although GAD and PD patients may exhibit elevated muscle tension and abnormal autonomic and respiratory measures-during laboratory baseline assessments, the available evidence does not allow us to conclude that physiological activation decreases over the course of MRT in GAD and PD, patients, even when patients report becoming less anxious. Better-designed studies will be required to identify the mechanisms of MRT and to advance clinical practice. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
引用
收藏
页码:243 / 264
页数:22
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