Effects of anger awareness and expression training versus relaxation training on headaches: a randomized trial.

ABSTRACT:

Background and purpose

Stress contributes to headaches, and effective interventions for headaches routinely include relaxation training (RT) to directly reduce negative emotions and arousal. Yet, suppressing negative emotions, particularly anger, appears to augment pain, and experimental studies suggest that expressing anger may reduce pain. Therefore, we developed and tested anger awareness and expression training (AAET) on people with headaches.

Methods

Young adults with headaches (N = 147) were randomized to AAET, RT, or a wait-list control. We assessed affect during sessions, and process and outcome variables at baseline and 4 weeks after treatment.

Results

On process measures, both interventions increased self-efficacy to manage headaches, but only AAET reduced a

SUBMITTER: Slavin-Spenny O 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3778035 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature