One form of rock climbing called bouldering is performed without any use of tools like ropes or harnesses. This specific activity, according to a growing body of research, is stated to be of help in building muscle endurance while also reducing stress. Now, a new study co-led by a doctoral student of psychology at the University of Arizona suggests that bouldering may also be used as an effective treatment of symptoms of depression.
Eva-Maria Stelzer, researcher from the University of Arizona and Katharina Luttenberger from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg led a team involving over 100 individuals in a bouldering intervention in Germany. There, some hospitals are already using climbing as a therapeutic treatment.
The participants were indiscriminately
…show more content…
She actually began researching the benefits of bouldering while she was finishing her master’s in psychology at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany. She is now finishing her doctorate at the University of Arizona. She also said that there are different paths for the level of your physical activity. There’s also a social aspect coupled with the feeling of immediate accomplishment when you are bouldering. She will be presenting the study and its findings at the 29th annual Association for Psychological Science Convention to be held this weekend in …show more content…
The duration that involved the intervention and the follow-up lasted 24 weeks.
According to Stelzer, bouldering has other important characteristics that make it very beneficial for the treatment of depression. It helps increase self-efficacy and social interactions. These two have intrinsic benefits for dealing with depression. And since the participants have to be mindful and focus on the moment, there’s not much room for them to let their mind wonder on things that are happening in their lives. They just focus on not falling.
Aside from having strong mental components, bouldering is also accessible at different levels so people of different levels of physical health can participate. And because people who suffer from depression deal with isolation, bouldering as a treatment doesn’t just increase physical activity but can also be used as a tool to allow interaction with one