소루등마사지 요법에 의한 중년여성의 스트레스 완화

Abstract

Previous research has suggested that massage, is effective in reducing symptoms related to stress, fatigue, depression in the middle-aged women. In particular, the Soru massage therapy is known to generate energy that flows through the body along the afferent pathways and maintain the homeostasis of body by controlling the body temperature. Soru massage is intended to eliminate obstacles to energy circulation, promotes blood circulation and promotes excretion of waste products, restores muscle fatigue, and stimulates muscles including nervous systems. Soru massage can be performed on different body parts such as head, neck, and back. In this study, the aim of this study is examine to the extent of Soru back massage therapy on the middle-aged women in terms of reducing stress. To conduct this study, a literature survey method and an empirical research method were concurrently applied. To conduct empirical part of this research, massage therapists were also randomly selected and the middle-aged women were randomly selected from age 40 and 59 from August 1, 2017 to September 10, 2017. A total of 14 participants received the back massage treatment; each therapy session took about 50 minutes three times a week for 5 weeks. The participants were asked to fill out one survey questionnaire before receiving a massage therapy session and one after receiving a massage therapy. The effects of massage therapy on the stress relief of middle-aged women was tested using a t-test. All of the empirical analyzes of this study were conducted at significance level p <.05. In conclusion, this study has demonstrated that Soru back massage was highly effective in relieving stress related symptoms of middle-aged women. Additional implication of this study is that the back massage appeared to have relieving effects on other body parts including the neck, shoulder, back, and loins. However, it should be noted that the history of Soru massage therapy is relatively shorter than other massage therapies such as meridian, sports, and aromatherapy. The limitations of this study is the lack of previous research on Soru massage. Because of its short history, literature on Soru massage was inevitably limited at the time of conducting this research. Furthermore, this study is limited to middle-aged women as other groups of individuals were not examined. For future study, considering frequent association with stress and pain, elderly population and students can be examined to understand the effects of Soru back massage. In particular, since high school students need to sit on the chair all day long and often experience neck pains, it would be useful to examine the effects of receiving the Soru back massage therapy for relieving stress and neck pain symptoms. Nonetheless, because Soru back massage therapy is shown to be effective in relieving related symptoms of middle-aged women, we can expect to see popularization of Soru massage among other groups. Because this study is only an exploratory research, more similar studies on should be conducted in the future. Keywords: Soru back massage therapy, middle-aged women, relief of stress