The Tapping Evidence Base
Depression

The effectiveness of emotional freedom techniques (EFT) on depression of postmenopausal women: a randomized controlled trial

Abedi, P., Mehdipour, A., Ansari, S., Dastoorpoor, M. · Maturitas · 2023

Randomized trial⚖️ vs. control conditionPreliminary✓ Source-checked📍 Iran
In plain English. This is a brief conference abstract describing a randomized trial testing EFT for depression in postmenopausal women, but the catalog text provided does not include the study's results, so no conclusion can be drawn from this entry alone. (Note: a fuller companion paper by overlapping authors, Mehdipour et al. 2021, reports detailed results for what appears to be a related or the same study population.)

What they found

This conference abstract states the study aimed to evaluate the effect of EFT on depression in postmenopausal women; detailed results were not included in the available abstract text.

How the study worked

Who took partpostmenopausal women
What they didIn a randomized controlled trial, participants were randomly assigned to receive tapping or a comparison condition, then measured and compared.
Compared withcontrol condition
Measured withdepression measure (unspecified in abstract)

💡 Where this could help

Picture a woman navigating the mood changes of menopause, a life stage often under-addressed by a healthcare system focused elsewhere. If a full report of this trial's results shows real promise, it could point toward a self-taught, free-to-use option for a population with surprisingly few targeted mental health tools.

🔬 What to study next

The abstract alone can't say much, so the first step is simply getting the full results published with actual numbers. From there, postmenopausal depression is a promising place to look at biology directly: does tapping shift cortisol patterns or inflammatory markers that fluctuate with hormonal change, and does it correlate with objectively tracked improvements in hot flashes or sleep via actigraphy, alongside the depression scores?

The full record

DesignRandomized trial
Populationpostmenopausal women
Comparison groupcontrol condition
Outcome measuresdepression measure (unspecified in abstract)
JournalMaturitas
Year2023
CountryIran
LanguageEnglish
MethodEFT / tapping
Publication typeStudy / trial
Verification✓ Confirmed against the primary source

Read the original study →

Cite this study

APA

Abedi, P., Mehdipour, A., Ansari, S., & Dastoorpoor, M. (2023). The effectiveness of emotional freedom techniques (EFT) on depression of postmenopausal women: a randomized controlled trial. Maturitas. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.maturitas.2023.04.019

This record is part of the Tapping Evidence Base — an openly-sourced, fully-referenced directory of the research on EFT/tapping. Explore more studies on Depression

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THE TAPPING EVIDENCE BASE Depression ✓ Randomized trial WHAT THEY FOUND This conference abstract states the studyaimed to evaluate the effect of EFT ondepression in postmenopausal women… Randomized trial Abedi · 2023 · evidence.thetappingsolution.com