Effects of music and imagery on physiologic and self-report of analogued labor pain

Author(s): Lower, M., Beattie, S., Beck, N.

Journal/Book: Nurs Res. 1989; 38: 37-41.

Abstract: Two studies were conducted to examine the effects of music on analogued labor pain using volunteer nulliparous subjects who were randomly assigned to treatment groups (n = 10 per group). Assessments of the treatments were made in a 1-hour session involving twenty 80-second exposures to a laboratory pain stimulus patterned to resemble labor contractions. In the first experiment, it was hypothesized that subjects listening to easy-listening music would report lower pain ratings and cardiovascular responses than subjects listening to rock music, self-selected music, or a dissertation (placebo-attention) and subjects in a no-treatment control group. No significant group effects were found; significant time effects were found for heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure. Subjects spontaneously reported using imagery as a pain reduction technique. In the second study a combination of music and imagery was examined by randomly assigning subjects to one of five groups: self-generated imagery with music (SIM), guided imagery with music (GIM), self-generated imagery without music (SI), guided imagery without music (GI), or no-treatment control. Again, no significant group effects were obtained. Significant time effects were obtained for heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure.

Keyword(s): Adult ; Hemodynamics ; Imagination ; Music ; Pain psychology; Pregnancy Labor physiology; Pain physiopathology; Relaxation Techniques Comparative Study; Female; Human; Support, U.S. Gov't, P.H.S.

Zurück | Weiter