Research on energy medicine

[pacificwhim]

I'm a journalist and I'm researching a book about alternative healing and medicine. But as a journalist, I have to approach the subject from a healthy skeptic's point of view. Does anyone know if there is any credible research that's been done showing that these energy healing methods actually work?

[psinomad]

Hi,

There are many on internet u just need to spend some time to digg them up.

One older one u can find on Society for Scientific Exploration web site.

Short abstract: The Effect of the "Laying On of Hands" on Transplanted Breast Cancer in Mice

Full text PDF

Good luck to you

Oh and BTW, energy healing works!!!!

PsiNomad

[anonymous]

for research on energy healing try searching the internet for "therapeutic touch research" I found these articles:

An integrative review and meta-analysis of therape...[Altern Ther Health Med. 1999] - PubMed Result
An integrative review and meta-analysis of therapeutic touch research.

Most of the studies supported hypotheses regarding the efficacy of therapeutic touch, though a number had mixed or negative results. A meta-analysis was performed on 13 studies. The average effect size in these studies was .39, which is described as moderate. Gaps, trends, and outcomes were identified and discussed.

long list of research articles here:
BestHealth

research articles here too
InteliHealth:


One form of spiritual healing that anyone can do is described here:

http://www.geocities.com/chs4o8pt/sp...l_healing.html


I was taught healing in a spiritualist church. I was told that the intention to heal is all that is necessary. However if you have the intention to heal and you shake a rattle and dance around the patient that works too, this is why there are so many different types of energy healing. They are all fundamentally the same.

[SkepticalBry]

In April 1998, the /Journal of the American Medical Association/ (JAMA) published results of an experiment by Emily Rosa, testing whether professional practitioners of "therapeutic touch" (TT) could feel a person's "human energy field" while their sight of the person was obstucted. In 280 single-blind trials, 21 TT practitioners did slightly worse than expected by random guessing, hitting a 50% chance 44% of the time.

JAMA. 1998;279:1005-1010
JAMA -- Abstract: A Close Look at Therapeutic Touch, April 1, 1998, Rosa et al. 279 (13): 1005

JAMA is a top-tier scientific journal, unlike the /Journal of Scientific Exploration/ which only exists to publish papers that cannot meet the standards of serious journals. JAMA publishes important results, and submissions face a rigorous peer-review process.

So don't be put off by the fact that the scientist performing this experiment was nine years old.

Emily Rosa - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


-Bryan

[jacob]

Bryan,

Emily's research is interesting and might have showed that these 21 "therapeutic touch" practitioners could not feel people's energy field, if it exists.

But you can't state, like you stated in the title, that her research debunks "human energy field".

[RainCrow]

I would not expect JAMA to publish any positive research results given their solid entrenchment in the medical establishment. If anyone knows of any such articles published in JAMA, please let us know. I would be gratified to be proved wrong and thus to know that open-mindedness in research is increasing. It is difficult to admit to research findings that go against the establishment. No one wants to be thought of as gullible or ill-informed.

RainCrow

[SkepticalBry]

JAMA results are not like parapsychology. If you think Rosa's conclusion only applies to those 21 practitioners, you can repeat the experiment for yourself. We skeptics cannot find *anyone* who can actually demo.

If you have a different concept of some energy field around people, what does it predict that we can test?

In answer to pacificwhim's question, no, there is no credible evidence for "energy healing" methods. The attention can elevate a patient's mood to positive effect, but the theories and rituals are indistinguishable from made-up nonsense.


Teaching "energy healing" to children strikes me a terrible idea. We should teach them not to be so gullible.

[Shellye]

I am wondering what it is about the metaphysical and energy healing you are drawn to, that would bring you to take the time to be here and post, if you did not somewhere believe it, or wonder about it?????

Shellye

[pacificwhim]

Thanks to everyone who provided links for my research.

As for the JAMA paper, I've already encountered serious resistance (and in some cases, irrational anger) in the mainstream medical and scientific community to my inquiries. This seems to me to be antithetical to science—refusing to explore something because you don't think it can be true. That's a cyclical argument.

Nine years old? If that's true, then it casts serious doubt on JAMA's reliability as an unbiased resource. I can't fathom a journal that would expect an experiment by a child to be taken seriously. That it's cited by any skeptic smells of desperation to disprove what you have already decided can't be true.

I'll continue to conduct my own inquiries and do my own research.

[SkepticalBry]

Well, I don't think it's a matter of me being drawn to these things. I sure hope not, because I'm the same way about 9-11-was-an-inside-job theories.

Skeptics were invited to the forum, and when pacificwhim's question appeared on the main Parapsychology articles and blog site, I thought I'd present a bit of our side. Plus I took his line about being a journalist and taking a healthy skeptic's point of view too seriously. Yeah, I can be gullible too.