A comparison of the effects of progressive muscle relaxation and guided imagery on stress reduction

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to compare the eof fectivenes.s. of· two· relaxation. techniques,. progressive. muscle relaxation (PMR) and guided imagery (GI), on the red-uction o·f stre·ss. A· total. of· 52 subjects completed the· study ('PMR··, N--17.; ·Gr, N-20;. control, N--15). A pre-test post-test multigroup ·experimental design was_ the design method utilized in this study. .Stress levels were measured using Lefebvre's -Strain Questionnaire. 'I'reatment s:ubjects received. a 45.minute training, were asked .. to listen to. an audio tape of the. relaxation technique once daily, and returned-after two weeks for·p~st-t~st. A repeated measures MANOVA_ indic.ated a. significant interaction between the groups. (F=21.09, p· < .01). A Tukey HSD procedure indi~ated that the coritrol _group differed significantly from. the two_ treatment groups -(p < .05). The.·treatmen~ groups did not differ significantly from each other. The hypothe?is that GI would be more effective than PMR in reducing ·stress was not .s.upported_. It was concluded that neither GI nor PMR were more effective in. reducing_ stress.