YOGA
Why Yoga?
Yoga is one of the many techniques people use to cope with stress. Within recent years, the practice of yoga has become increasingly popular with a 4.8% increase from 2012 to 2017 from 9.5% to 14.3% (Clarke et al., 2018). So what makes it so appealing? It gives people the opportunity to escape their chaotic and busy lives. Yoga also gives people the chance to challenge themselves physically, but not feel overwhelmed. When practicing yoga, it is not just a physical workout, but a combination of mind and body exercises. Some of these exercises may include breath control, adoption of physical postures, and mediation or relaxation. There are also many types of yoga with Hatha and Vinyasa being some of the more popular styles. With many styles of yoga to choose from, people are given the opportunity to find the one that best fits them.
The Scientific Evidence
Yoga not only has a significant impact in a lifestyle setting but in a clinical setting as well. There have been many scientific studies conducted that suggest yoga plays a role in stress reduction.
In 2008 a study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of yoga for reducing psychological stress and enhancing emotional well-being. 48 university employees were put into either a yoga or wait-list group. The 24 employees in the yoga group were offered six weeks of Dru Yoga with each class being 60 minutes long. The results of this study showed that the group who underwent Dru Yoga reported better mood and well-being (Hartfield et al., 2011). Compared to the wait-list group, the yoga group also reported marked improvements in feelings of clear-mindedness, composure, elation, energy, and confidence along with increased life purpose and satisfaction, and feelings of greater self-confidence during stressful situations (Hartfield et al., 2011).
In 2017 a systemic review with a meta-analysis was conducted to investigate the effects of active control yoga versus yoga asana, with and without mindfulness-based stress reduction on physiological markers of stress. Results based on the forty-two studies analyzed found that yoga practice appears to have inhibitory effects on physiological stress, as demonstrated by reduced cortisol, systolic blood pressure, heart rate, and heart rate variability (Pascoe et al., 2017). For those who don't know, cortisol is the primary stress hormone in the body. Moving on, results also found that interventions including yoga asanas were associated with reduced evening cortisol, waking cortisol, ambulatory systolic blood pressure, resting heart rate, high-frequency heart rate variability, fasting blood glucose, cholesterol, and low-density lipoprotein (Pascoe et al., 2017). For more context, low-density lipoproteins are considered "bad cholesterol" and what makes up most of your cholesterol levels.
References :
Clarke, T., Barnes, P., Black, L., Stussman, B., & Nahin, R. (2018, September). Use of Yoga, Meditation, and Chiropractors
Among U.S. Adults Aged 18 and Over. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db325.htm#Key_findings
Hartfiel, N., Havenhand, J., Khalsa, S. B., Clarke, G., & Krayer, A. (2011). The effectiveness of yoga for the improvement of
well-being and resilience to stress in the workplace. Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment & Health, 37(1), 70–76.
https://doi.org/10.5271/sjweh.2916​
NCCIH. (2021, April). Yoga : What You Need To Know. National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health. https://www.nccih.nih.gov/health/yoga-what-you-need-to- know
Pascoe, M. C., Thompson, D. R., & Ski, C. F. (2017). Yoga, mindfulness-based stress reduction and stress-related physiological
measures: A meta-analysis. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 86, 152–168. https://doi.org/https://doi-org.ezproxy.library.unlv.edu/10.1016/j.psyneuen.2017.08.008
MUSIC
Music helps with Stress?
Music has been around for many centuries and only just recently been studied for its effect on stress. Music listening is strongly connected with stress reduction by the decrease of physiological arousal by way of reduced cortisol(stress hormone) levels, lowered heart rate, and decreases in blood pressure. Music can also reduce negative emotions and feelings, such as worry, anxiety, restlessness or nervousness and increase positive emotions and feelings, such as happiness. Music also modulates activity in brain structures, such as the amygdala and the mesolimbic reward brain system, which are known to be involved in emotional and motivational processes (Fiore et al., 2020). Music is a great tool to use when trying to escape reality when dealing with something hard such as sad or unpleasant feelings, during an intense workout at the gym or even just to liven up and have fun doing mundane tasks like sweeping or doing the dishes.
The Research
One study that was conducted looked at the effects of sedative and stimulative music on stress reduction. As stated in the article, Stimulative music is commonly characterized by fast tempos, loud volume, and rhythmic patterns, while sedative music is slow, soft, with little rhythmic activity (2013). During the study the participants were exposed to a stressor, in this case it was a timed math test. Then were separated in to experimental groups being: preferred sedative music, preferred stimulative music, unpreferred sedative music, and unpreferred stimulative music. The results revealed that, after exposure to a stressor, individuals who listened to sedative music perceived themselves to be significantly less tense and anxious than did those who listened to stimulative music when music was unpreferred. However, individuals did not show difference between listening to sedative and stimulative music in reducing tension and state-anxiety levels when music was preferred (Jiang et al., 2013). These findings suggest that the effects of sedative and stimulative music on stress reduction depend on music preference. This means that based only on music sedative music created more stress reduction than stimulative music. However, stimulative music did just as good as sedative if the participant preferred that kind of music.
Another study that I found looked at if music or self-regulating / calming strategies worked better for stress reduction. During the study the participants were separated in to a self-regulatory/ calming exercise group and a music group. Then they were exposed to a stressor of a combination of heat-based pain and a fast-paced decision-making task, then asked to calm them self’s or listen to music depending on the group they were in. It was concluded that Both the adequacy of the music and the adequacy of the strategy expressed themselves in the affective outcomes of stress reduction. Yet, given that music creates the platform where the process takes place, its adequacy has an immediate and decisive impact on the regulatory efforts (Baltazar et al., 2019). This means that self-calming strategies and music are just as effective at reducing stress as one another but, music is better at facilitating and the stress reduction.
References:
Baltazar, Margarida, Västfjäll, Daniel, Asutay, Erkin, Koppel, Lina, & Saarikallio, Suvi. (2019). Is it me or the music? Stress reduction and the role of regulation strategies and music. Music & Science, 2, 205920431984416. https://doi.org/10.1177/2059204319844161
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Fiore, J., Sittler, M. C., Worschech, F., Wilz, G., Fellgiebel, A., Wuttke-Linnemann, A., …Hooren, S. van. (2020, November 12). Health Psychology Review. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/citedby/10.1080/17437199.2020.1846580?scroll=top&needAccess=true.
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Jiang, Jun, Zhou, Linshu, Rickson, Daphne, & Jiang, Cunmei. (2013). The effects of sedative and stimulative music on stress reduction depend on music preference. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 40(2), 201–205. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aip.2013.02.002