Massage and Storytelling Reduce Aggression and Improve Academic Performance in Children Attending Elementary School.
Lia Lopes Gonçalves, Mariana Callil Voos, Maria Helena Morgani de Almeida and 1 others
PMID 29097967WHAT IT FOUND
Children in weekly massage classes plus daily paired massage, and children in weekly storytelling classes plus daily paired retelling, had fewer teacher-recorded aggressive episodes and higher mean grades than control children in an extra class plus daily paired recall in one public school.
Key findings
01After the intervention, teacher records showed fewer aggressive episodes per student in the massage group, from 1.5 to 0.5, and in the storytelling group, from 1.4 to 0.8, compared with the control group.
02After the intervention, mean grades were higher in the massage group, from 6.8 to 7.4, and in the storytelling group, from 6.5 to 7.0, compared with the control group.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
The study was done in one public elementary school in São Paulo, so it does not show what would happen in schools with different social contexts. Students were not randomly assigned to groups; only classrooms were randomly assigned. The same teachers gave the extra class and assessed aggressive behavior for each group, and they may have inferred a link between massage, storytelling, and aggression. Teachers were not told the study aims, but they delivered the interventions and kept the aggression diaries. The paper does not report how many children were analysed in each classroom group. Outcomes were assessed only before and after a short intervention period, not at longer follow-up.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that therapist-delivered massage or storytelling will reduce aggression or raise grades in other schools. The interventions were delivered by trained classroom teachers in one public school, and students were not randomly assigned to groups.