Will a Massage Chair Help Reduce Stress and Anxiety?

One of the main reasons you might consider a massage chair in the first place is simply because you want to relax.

It’s quite literally in our brand name!

Having a massage in a massage chair is definitely relaxing, however is there actual proof that it can reduce stress and anxiety?

Today, I’m going to do the bulk of the research for you, so you don’t have to.

So without further ado, let’s see what existing research on massage chairs say.

TLDR:

What does Research Say about the Stress and Anxiety Related Benefits of a Massage Chair

There’s two really good pieces of research that I found regarding massage chairs that I wanted to share today.

Massage Chair Research Piece 1: A Study on Mental Fatigue and Cognitive Function

This piece of research focused on understanding the relationship between usage of massage chairs, and their impact on mental cognitive function, as well as mental fatigue.

It used both a normal massage chair, as well as played relaxing music in the form of “binaural beats” to see whether or not it would reduce the mental fatigue that people felt.

It was carried out on 25 people, for which the results were as follows:

• “the decrease in mental fatigue was statistically significant compared to taking a rest or receiving a mechanical massage only on the massage chair.”
• “verbal short-term and long-term memory and non-verbal long-term memory were statistically significantly increased after using brain massage”

I would normally drop a link to the massage chair research like this, but I think it deserves the full name drop in this blog. If you want to view this research further, I’ve linked their DOI right here.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ctcp.2018.04.008

Massage Chair Research Piece 2: A Study on Stress Levels and 6 Month Usage of Massage Chairs

This piece of massage chair researched focused on the balance between the stress levels in the body and the usage of a massage chair over six months. It was done to see whether or not having a massage chair would actually make people feel relaxed, which was measured by the person’s cortisol levels.

They took 80 adults, and made them use a massage chair twice a day for 6 months, for which the results are as follows:

• “Chronic stress in adults could be effectively managed using a massage chair.”
• “This study demonstrated that 6-month use of a massage chair resulted in a significant reduction in DHEA-S and a trend of decreasing serum cortisol levels”
• “Furthermore, there was a significant improvement in the depressive mood and subjective health status using a massage chair.”

This piece of massage chair research was completed in June 2022, which shows its recency. If you’re interested in reading it for yourself, here’s the link to it.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ctim.2022.102825

What does Massage Chair Research Prove For Reducing Stress and Anxiety

So after reading through these two reports, there are three main points to take away from this.

• Massage chairs do have health benefits for people when it comes to reducing stress
• Massage chairs help promote relaxation
• Massage chairs can help promote other mental health benefits, such as increased cognitive function

So after reading through these two reports, there are three main points to take away from this.

• Massage chairs do have health benefits for people when it comes to reducing stress
• Massage chairs help promote relaxation
• Massage chairs can help promote other mental health benefits, such as increased cognitive function

What this means for users of massage chairs is that it can help relieve a lot of mental pressure. There is no clear proven link to reducing anxiety, however there is clear scientific proof which backs up the claim of massage chairs reducing stress.

If you are looking to reduce anxiety with a massage chair, then it might be best to first consider whether or not massages help you with anxiety.

Since the role of a massage chair is simply to recreate the massage experience at home, it’s important to know if your body responds well to massages.

To test this, we’d recommend you go to a local Swedish or Thai massage place, and see how your anxiety responds.

If you find that it does not help, then a massage chair might not help you reduce anxiety.

If it does help, then it makes sense to consider buying a massage chair.

Conclusion: Massage Chairs are Proven to Reduce Stress, and Can Reduce Anxiety

The best recommendation I can give to you if you are looking for ways to deal with stress, especially work or study related stress, is to simply buy a massage chair.

If you’ve had a long day, and can’t wait to get back home and relax, then a massage chair is perfect. Your home is your safe haven, it’s your chance to disconnect, so why not disconnect while relaxing in a massage chair?

It just makes perfect sense.

If you’re someone that’s just had too much at work, or is looking to even make their life at work less stressful, I have a blog that you might want to forward to your manager!

If you want to have an easier, less tense time at work, while also convincing your managers to let you relax more, I’ve written a very compelling piece on how massage chairs are a great addition to the office at work!