Breathwork and its effect on stress in healthy individuals : a systematic review

Sammanfattning: Stress is an ongoing and increasing problem at a societal and individual level. This systematic review aims to evaluate which effects breathwork has on stress in a healthy population. A literature search was done on Scopus, and Web of Science for peer-reviewed, published, and original research. In the search process, it was decided to include psychological and physiological assessments due to the narrow topic. Threestudies met the inclusion criteria and were included in this review. The outcome measurements included were heart-rate variability (HRV) which measures the activity in the autonomic nervous system (ANS) and salivary cortisol to measure cortisol as a biomarker of psychological stress, as well as the questionnaires PSS, PANAS, and STAI. There are many different breathwork techniques, in this review the focus is oncontrolled, slow deep breathing techniques e.g. diaphragmatic breathing, resonance breathing, and cyclic sighing. All three studies showed significant improvement in stress in the breathing groups. These findings suggest that breathwork can be valuable in reducing stress in healthy individuals. Furthermore, more research is needed before conclusions on the general population can be drawn.