Spiritual Emotional Freedom Technique Influences Anxiety and Recovery Motivation of COVID-19 Patients

Controlled trial👥 68 participants⚖️ vs. control group (pre-post, control group design)Moderate rigor✓ Source-checked📍 Indonesia

In plain English. This is the Indonesian SEFT variant of tapping, which adds Islamic prayer and spiritual surrender to the standard tapping steps — not the same as the secular EFT protocol used in most Western studies. 68 COVID-19 patients in a quarantine facility in Indonesia were split into a group that received five days of SEFT and a comparison group. The SEFT group reported both less anxiety and more motivation to recover than the comparison group. It's a single-site study during an unusual pandemic circumstance.

What they found

people took part

After five daily SEFT sessions, there was a significant difference in anxiety level (p=0.000) and recovery motivation (p=0.000) between groups, per the published abstract.

How the study worked

Who took partCOVID-19 patients at a quarantine facility in Probolinggo, Indonesia (n=68)

What they didIn a controlled trial, a tapping group was compared against a separate comparison group.

Compared withcontrol group (pre-post, control group design)

Measured withHamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HARS), recovery motivation questionnaire

💡 Where this could help

If findings like these hold up in larger trials, the promise is simple: a low-cost, self-administered tool that could reach people struggling with anxiety who can't easily access traditional care — at home, between appointments, or where there aren't enough clinicians to go around.

🔬 What to study next

The natural next step: longer-term follow-up to see how durable the benefit is, and an active ('sham tapping') control to isolate what's doing the work.

The full record

Design	Controlled trial
Participants	68 people
Population	COVID-19 patients at a quarantine facility in Probolinggo, Indonesia
Comparison group	control group (pre-post, control group design)
Outcome measures	Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HARS), recovery motivation questionnaire
Journal	Jurnal Keperawatan (STIKes Kendal)
Year	2021
Country	Indonesia
Language	Indonesian
Method	EFT / tapping
Publication type	Study / trial
Verification	✓ Confirmed against the primary source

Read the original study →

Cite this study

APA

Kurnianingsih, M. F., Nahdatien, I., & Zahroh, C. (2021). Spiritual Emotional Freedom Technique Influences Anxiety and Recovery Motivation of COVID-19 Patients. Jurnal Keperawatan (STIKes Kendal). https://doi.org/10.32583/keperawatan.v13i3.1685

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 Anxiety