薰衣草精油芳香療法對女大學生心理與生理健康之短期與長期效果

Aromatherapy Massage with Lavender Essential Oil Had Short-Term and Prolonged Effects on the Mental and Physical Health of Female University Students

研究目的：薰衣草精油已被證實具有舒緩情緒與降低焦慮的效果。然而，過去研究多為橫斷式設計，且較少聚焦於承受相當學業壓力的大學生族群。本研究旨在探討使用薰衣草精油進行芳香療法按摩，對女性大學生身心健康之短期與持續性效果。研究方法：本研究採單組前後測設計，以某科技大學美容美髮科66名二年級女學生為對象。參與者接受為期三週、每週一次、每次15分鐘之5%薰衣草精油芳香療法按摩。於每次按摩前後，測量心理（生活壓力量表、貝克焦慮量表、貝克憂鬱量表）與生理（收縮壓、舒張壓與心跳速率）指標。研究結果：配對t檢定顯示，每次芳香療法按摩後，心理與生理指標均顯著下降。重複量數變異數分析發現，大多數指標在三週期間呈現持續改善的趨勢。研究結論：接受薰衣草精油芳香療法按摩後，女性大學生的心理與生理症狀，不論在短期或整體研究期間皆獲得改善。顯示薰衣草精油具有作為此族群減壓介入措施之潛力，並可有效緩解女性大學生的身心壓力症狀。

Purpose: Past research indicates that massage combined with aromatherapy has psychological and physiological relaxation effects. Lavender essential oil is known to alleviate emotional distress and reduce anxiety. Research into its effects has mostly been cross-sectional and has rarely focused on university students, a population that experiences both developmental and academic stress. We investigated the short-term and prolonged effects of aromatherapy massage using lavender essential oil on the mental and physical health of female university students. Methods: We used a single-group pre-test and post-test design and recruited 66 female sophomore students from a beauty and hairdressing program at a technical university. They received a 15-minute massage with 5% lavender essential oil once a week for 3 weeks. We assessed psychological indicators (using the life stress scale, the Beck anxiety inventory, and the Beck depression inventory) and physiological indicators (systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, and heart rate) before and after each aromatherapy massage. Results: Paired t-tests showed significant reductions in psychological and physiological indicator values immediately after each session. One-way repeated-measures of analysis of variance revealed significant, progressive decreases in most indicators over the 3-week period. Conclusions: After receiving aromatherapy massages with lavender essential oil, female students showed reduced mental and physical stress symptoms after each session and over the entire period of the study. Our result highlights a potential use of lavender oil and massage as a stress-reduction intervention in this population. Future research is needed to discriminate the impact of the aromatherapy from the massage and from a control condition as well as to determine whether the impact is similar for male students.