EasyBreezyMind
1 peer-reviewed source, DOI-verifiedUpdated Oct 1, 2026How we verify
Can practising slow belly breathing change how you feel and focus — and even your stress hormones? This randomized study with healthy adults tested exactly that.
| Study type | Randomized controlled trial |
|---|---|
| Who took part | 40 healthy adults |
| What was tested | 20 sessions of diaphragmatic breathing over 8 weeks (about 4 breaths per minute, with a feedback device) vs. no training |
| Published | Frontiers in Psychology, 2017 |
| Free to read | Full text on PubMed Central |
| Licence | Open access, Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) |
What the researchers did
Participants were randomly assigned to a breathing group or a control group. The breathing group trained intensively with a real-time feedback device at an average of four breaths a minute. Everyone completed attention and mood tests before and after, and gave saliva samples to measure cortisol.
What they found
- The breathing group showed less negative affect after training.
- Their sustained attention improved compared with baseline.
- Their cortisol was significantly lower after training, while the control group showed no change.
What this doesn’t prove
- It was a small study of 40 people.
- The training used a feedback device and a very slow pace; results for casual, unguided practice may differ.
- The control group received no alternative activity, so some benefit could come from simply doing something structured.
How to use this
You don’t need a device to practise slow breathing. Try 5 minutes of resonance breathing in our Breathing Regulator and track your sessions in My Calm.
After 20 sessions of diaphragmatic breathing over 8 weeks, healthy adults showed less negative affect, better sustained attention and lower cortisol, while the control group did not change.
Summary written by EasyBreezyMind in our own words. Original article: Ma X, et al. (2017). The Effect of Diaphragmatic Breathing on Attention, Negative Affect and Stress in Healthy Adults. Frontiers in Psychology. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00874. © The authors. Published open access under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence. This summary is educational and is not endorsed by the authors.