Re: I want to test to see if aromatherapy really affects mood, how can i ?

Dear Ashley,

The way to determine if an aromatherapy affects mood is to perform a 
"double-blind" study.  Dr. Jerold M. Lowenstein, a physician at the 
University of California at San Francisco, provides a good description of 
this research design- please see:

 http://www.calacademy.org/calwild/archives/spr98/counter.htm


The basic method is to have two groups of people: one group receives the 
drug (or, treatment) being analyzed (in your case, "aromatherapy"), while 
the second group receives a "placebo".  Neither the people receiving the 
treatments nor the experimenter (in this case, you) knows who is getting 
which treatment until after all the tests have been completed.  A code has 
to be assigned to each treatment, so that results can be collected without 
the experimenter knowing what treatment the "patient" was given.

You may also obtain information from medical literature via PubMed, which 
is "the National Library of Medicine's search service that provides access 
to over 10 million citations in MEDLINE, PreMEDLINE, and other related 
databases, with links to participating online journals."  The web address 
is:

 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=PubMed


On February 1, 2000, I searched PubMed using the terms "aromatherapy" AND 
"mood" and found five articles.  I believe that you will be able to get 
copies of some (or all) of these articles from a medical center near you 
(you may need to contact the University of South Carolina School of 
Medicine).

Here is some of the information that I found:

JOURNAL:  Int J Neurosci 1998 Dec;96(3-4):217-24
ARTICLE TITLE:  Aromatherapy positively affects mood, EEG patterns of 
alertness and math computations. 
AUTHORS: Diego MA, Jones NA, Field T, Hernandez-Reif M, Schanberg, S, Kuhn 
C, McAdam V, Galamaga R, Galamaga M

People were exposed one of two aromas, lavender or rosemary.  Both groups 
of people reported feeling more relaxed.


JOURNAL:  Nurs Times 1993 May 19-25;89(20):32-5
ARTICLE TITLE:  Aromatherapy. 
AUTHOR:  Buckle J
This was a double-blind trial that assessed the emotional and behavioral 
responses of patients to two essential oils of two different species of 
lavender.  The author reports, "The therapeutic effects of the two 
lavenders appeared to be different: one was almost twice as effective as 
the other, thereby disproving the hypothesis that aromatherapy, using 
topical application of essential oils, is effective purely because of 
touch, massage or placebo."


JOURNAL:  J Adv Nurs 1995 Jan;21(1):34-40
ARTICLE TITLE:  Sensing an improvement: an experimental study to evaluate 
the use of aromatherapy, massage and periods of rest in an intensive care 
unit. 
AUTHORS: Dunn C, Sleep J, Collett D

Patients in an intensive care unit were assigned to one of three groups: 
those who received massage therapy, those who received aromatherapy using 
essential oil of lavender and those who simply rested.  The authors found 
that "those patients who received aromatherapy reported significantly 
greater improvement in their mood and perceived levels of anxiety. They 
also felt less anxious and more positive immediately following the therapy, 
although this effect was not sustained or cumulative.


When I searched using the terms "essential oil" AND "human", 83 literature 
items were identified.  For example, I found the abstract of an article 
entitled, "Alteration of perceived fragrance of essential oils in relation 
to type of work: a simple screening test for efficacy of aroma." (the first 
authors name is Y. Sugawara), which appeared in the journal  "Chemical 
Senses" (reference:  Chem Senses 1999 Aug;24(4):415-21).  The authors 
tested how people perceived the fragrance of several essential oils after 
working (i.e., mental work or physical work) or listening to 
"environmental" sounds.

You may be able to collect more information by searching for information on 
a particular essential oil.

Good luck in your search.  I caution you against using aromatherapy without 
first contacting your family physician.  As with many "alternative 
medicines", there are a large number of scientifically untested statements 
made about aromatherapy.  Although some of these statements may be true, I 
believe that it is best to be cautious.