Animal-Assisted Therapy with Farm Animals for Persons with Psychiatric Disorders: Effects on Anxiety and Depression, a Randomized Controlled Trial

Mental health rehabilitation in a care farm context: A descriptive review of Norwegian intervention studies

“…However, in the RCT study on animal-assisted intervention by Berget et al [27], these improvements were only found in anxiety levels and were only observed during a six-month follow-up assessment. In the single-group studies by Gonzalez et al [37,38] on therapeutic horticulture, the decreases in participants' depression levels observed during the intervention remained present three months after the end of the intervention.…”

“…In the first described study on animal-assisted interventions, by Berget et al [26,27], the treatment was not found to have any effect on depression, anxiety, and self-efficacy during the intervention period; however, a significant decrease in anxiety score and an increase in self-efficacy scores were found between the pre-treatment self-rated assessment and the six-month follow-up assessment. The participants with the largest reduction in depression reported the largest increases in perceived coping ability, mood, and self-esteem.…”

“…The first study is an RCT study by Berget et al [26][27][28]. This study examined the possible effects on mental health, quality of life, self-efficacy, and coping ability of taking part in work tasks with farm animals for people with various mental health disorders.…”

A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials of Animal-Assisted Therapy on Psychosocial Outcomes

“…In one study, various aspects of psychological outcomes of the same RCt were reported in two separate publications (Berget, Ekeberg and Braastad 2008;Berget et al 2011), and therefore this intervention is treated as one study in the present review. Sample sizes in the two studies differed substantially, with one study examining the efficacy of the intervention in a relatively small sample (n = 29; Pedersen et al 2012), and the other using a large sample (n = 90; Berget, Ekeberg and Braastad 2008;Berget et al 2011). Overall, there were 76 participants in the animal interventions, and 43 participants in the control conditions.…”

“…an important strength of the study is that follow-up assessments were conducted at three months. a Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled trials of animal-assisted therapy… 30 anthrozoös In two separate reports of the same study, Berget, Ekeberg and Braastad (2008) and Berget et al (2011) evaluated the effectiveness of an aaa intervention involving farm animals to decrease levels of depression and anxiety, and improve levels of self-efficacy, coping abilities, and quality of life. Ninety individuals with a psychiatric disorder (schizophrenia, mood disorder, personality disorder, or anxiety disorder) were randomly assigned to either 12 weeks of aaa with farm animals (n = 60) or to a control group who received treatment as usual (n = 30).…”