Scientific Research on EFT Tapping

APA Standards for Empirically Validated Treatments

EFT Universe supports the evidence-based standards defined by the American Psychological Association (APA) Division 12 (Clinical Psychology) Task Force (“APA standards” for short). These define an “empirically validated treatment” as one for which there are two different controlled trials conducted by independent research teams.

For a treatment to be designated as “efficacious,” the studies must demonstrate that the treatment is better than a wait list, placebo, or established efficacious treatment.

To be designated as “probably efficacious,” a treatment must have been shown to be better than a wait list in two studies that meet these criteria, or are conducted by the same research team rather than two independent teams. 

The APA standards advocate that studies contain sufficient subjects to achieve a level of statistical significance of p < .05 or greater, which means that there is only one possibility in 20 that the results are due to chance. The status of EFT as an evidence-based practice is summarized in this statement published in the APA journal Review of General Psychology: 

“A literature search identified 51 peer-reviewed papers that report or investigate clinical outcomes following the tapping of acupuncture points to address psychological issues. The 18 randomized controlled trials in this sample were critically evaluated for design quality, leading to the conclusion that they consistently demonstrated strong effect sizes and other positive statistical results that far exceed chance after relatively few treatment sessions. Criteria for evidence-based treatments proposed by Division 12 of the American Psychological Association were also applied and found to be met for a number of conditions, including PTSD.” (Feinstein, 2012)

The State of EFT Research

The results of all the published studies listed below are statistically significant. Many of them are randomized controlled trials or RCTs, a design generally regarded as the Gold Standard of research. EFT has met the APA standards as an “efficacious” treatment for phobias, anxiety, depression, and PTSD.

There are several definitions in the field of medicine (as distinguished from the field of psychology) of what constitutes an evidence-based treatment. One of the most useful comes from the US government’s National Registry of Evidence-Based Programs and Practices (NREPP).

It requires a standardized description of the method in the form of a manual and training materials, documentation that the treatment was delivered with fidelity to that method, the use of validated and reliable outcome measures, corrections for dropouts (such as an intent-to-treat analysis), appropriate statistical analysis, sample sizes sufficient to produce a probability of p < .05 or better, and publication in a peer-reviewed professional journal. NREPP has validated Thought Field Therapy (TFT), on which EFT is based, as an evidence-based practice, and this designation for EFT is expected to follow shortly.

EFT has been researched in more than 10 countries, by more than 60 investigators, whose results have been published in more than 20 different peer-reviewed journals.

These include distinguished top-tier journals such as Journal of Clinical Psychology, the APA journals Psychotherapy: Theory, Research, Practice, Training and Review of General Psychology, and the oldest psychiatric journal in North America, the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease.

EFT research includes investigators affiliated with many different institutions.

In the US, these range from Harvard Medical School, to the University of California at Berkeley, to City University of New York, to Walter Reed Military Medical Center, to Texas A&M University, to JFK University. Institutions in other countries whose faculty have contributed to EFT research include Staffordshire University (United Kingdom), Lund University (Sweden), Ankara University (Turkey), Santo Tomas University (Philippines), Lister Hospital (England), Cesar Vallejo University (Peru), Bond University (Australia), and Griffith University (Australia).

The wide variety of institutions, peer-reviewed journals, investigators, and settings that have, in independent research, found EFT to be efficacious, are one indication of the breadth of existing research results.

The next frontier of EFT research is replication of the studies that have not yet been replicated, and investigations into the physiological changes that occur during EFT, using such tools as gene expression analysis, MEGs (magnetoencephalograms), fMRIs, and neurotransmitter and hormone assays.

A number of meta-analyses, combining the results of many RCTs that meet the APA standards, have been published. Meta-analyses are considered to be at the top of the “hierarchy of evidence” because they combine the results of a whole body of scientific literature to measure “treatment effect.” This uses a measure called Cohen’s d (Cohen, 1988) or a slightly different calculation called Hedges’ g.

This scale ranges from a small treatment effect, d = 0.2 to a moderate effect, d = 0.5 to a large effect of d = 0.8. Meta-analyses show EFT to have a large treatment effect for anxiety, depression, and PTSD. For anxiety, d = 1.23 (Clond, 2016), for depression d = 1.31 (Nelms & Castel, 2016) and for PTSD, d = 2.96 (Sebastian & Nelms, 2016).

The EFT Universe training and certification program is based on “Clinical EFT,” a consistent and reliable protocol supported by this extensive base of evidence and clinical practice, and in conformity with the APA standards. EFT Universe trainings are accredited for CE/CME for doctors (American Medical Association), nurses (American Nurses Credentialing Commission), psychologists (American Psychological Association), social workers (NASWB), and many other professional organizations.

Outcome Studies, Clinical Reports, Mechanisms Research, and Review Articles

There are several kinds of research papers listed on these pages. The first is “outcome” research. These studies compare the medical or psychological outcomes of two groups of people with similar symptoms, or the same sample before and after EFT. Outcome studies measure changes in, for instance, pain, depression, or PTSD symptoms.

While an outcome study is designed to answer the research question “Does this work?” the second kind of paper asks the question “How does it work in the body?” With EFT having been shown in many outcome studies to work very quickly and reliably for a variety of ailments, researchers have also studied the physiological mechanisms of action by which such rapid healing is possible. So the second category of paper you will find below is mechanisms papers.

The third category of paper is the “clinical report.” Clinical reports describe the use of EFT with special groups, such as people with epilepsy, veterans, children, refugees, or prisoners. They may present a single case.

Next, there are “review papers.” These systematically gather together all the published evidence about a topic, present it in a structured manner, and evaluate that body of knowledge.

There is also a section listing papers written by skeptics and opponents of EFT. Despite a large and consistent evidence base, there are many professionals who remain unconvinced, some of whom actively campaign against the use of EFT or further research into EFT. You can make up your own mind after reading the arguments before and against.