Some people did a study of practitioners and participants of bdsm. According to a line in the study, participation reduced stress and "negative affect," meaning a bad mood, depression, etc.

There was an article published with the study results back in November 2016 in the "daily mail," of the uk.

The study results say that bdsm tends to result also in altered states of consciousness associated with creativity. I see that a few months ago roy munson started a thread on bd sessions and creativity but whether or not we discussed these study results, I do not know. Perhaps we did and I simply missed it.

It is easy to miss the study results re stress and bad mood, since the headlines of the study results are about bdsm helping people be more creative . . .

About 1 in six Americans takes psychiatric drugs of various types, with the majority being anti-depressants . . . I don't know of people taking legal drugs to be more creative . . .

Of course, other psychologically oriented studies find that you can get far better results in "treating" depression by 5 to 10 lifestyle changes than by taking drugs . . . though the main ones have not included getting spanked or caned or whipped as one of the lifestyle changes one might adopt for "depression."

If the headline was that bdsm reduces stress, anxiety and depression and bad mood, you would wonder if that meant that there was a therapeutic meaning and use to getting caned. Maybe that implication is bad and so the headline writer choose to write about creativity.

Personally, for me, I do find serving a domina (especially in person) excites me a lot and in the presence of such sexually charged excitement, negative moods naturally tend to go away. I have always seen bdsm sessions as therapeutic and not just a luxury.

Type in "russian whipping therapy" in Google and you will find interesting results. I have not read everything but there seems to be a lot to it.

There are many ways to treat psychiatric conditions including depression. There are gentler methods for people who are not into bdsm, of course.

Taking drugs is the worst. Half the time, it doesn't even work. It has been proven in some studies that medications actually increase anxiety, suicidal behavior, and homicidal behavior in people. The number one cause of gun violence in America is the use of psychiatric drugs, messing up people's brains -- not the gun itself (duh). Some people do respond positively to drugs, but they are never a good idea for the long term.

ztrade, Great topic. The old adage that says a Dominatrix is actually a low paid physiologist, is very true. Several of my submissives, fetishists, and slaves are using sessions with Me to work through complex issues. Many find that a cathartic session including serious endorphin release to be quite therapeutic!

Research has shown BDSM can induce altered states of consciousness. This is no surprise to those of us who have spent a lot of time doing this.

Thanks for mentioning this article. I read another from Time which references the same study.

For anyone interested, here's a link to a Daily Mail article ztrade is referring to: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/a...sciousness.html

"Maybe that implication is bad and so the headline writer choose to write about creativity."

It would be attacked by people who continue to conflate BDSM with abuse. And possibly by big pharm if it gained enough support and they felt it was a threat to their margin.

I have some articles that discuss various aspects of psych and kink in My blog under the tag "psychology". If anyone is interested, they can be found here:

https://mistresstissa.wordpress.com/tag/psychology/

I have had seen some amazing "breakthroughs" in session or reported shortly after. One of the most memorable and frightening was former Marine that suffered from PTSD. His wife, who was part of the session, wrote me later to say his personality had undergone a marked change for the better. He was sleeping, able to concentrate and was simply a nicer person to deal with. The mind is a wondrous and mysterious thing - and so is BDSM.