Reply to the Letter to the Editor Shahidi M, Mojtahed A, Modabbernia A., et al. 2011. Laughter yoga versus group exercise program in elderly depressed women: A randomized controlled trial. Int J Geriatr Psychiatr 26: 322-327. First things first! Caveats in research on 'laughter yoga'

摘要

As the authors of the paper "Laughter yoga versus group exercise program in elderly depressed women: a randomized controlled trial" (Shahidi et al, 2011), we would like to respond to the Letter to the Editor by Proyer and colleagues on our study. First, Proyer et al. stated that our paper is based on little scientific evidence and thus should not have been done before more basic sciences research in this area. We think there are several reasons for conducting such a study. First, being beneficial does not necessarily mean "promising results" from a randomized controlled trial. In addition, performing research is not necessarily based on exact knowledge of underlying mechanisms; for example, after showing that exercise is useful in decreasing depression symptomatology, several studies still try to elucidate what exercise exactly does in underlying neuronal structures. This is also true for many medications and alternative methods of treatment.