| Alternative medicine / fringe therapies | |
| Claims | Applying pressure to meridian points on the body, derived from acupuncture, can release energy blockages that cause negative emotions. |
|---|---|
| Related fields | Acupuncture, Acupressure |
| Year proposed | 1993 |
| Original proponents | Tapas Fleming |
| See also | Thought Field Therapy, Emotional Freedom Techniques |
Tapas Acupressure Technique (or TAT) is a controversial complementary therapy promoted to clear negative emotions and past traumas. Though the full technique was invented in 1993 by Tapas Fleming, a licensed acupuncturist in California, TAT incorporates elements of and builds on other acupressure techniques. Like other energy therapies, TAT relies on a putative energy for which no scientific basis has been found and no biophysical means of action determined.[1][2]
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Invented in 1993 by Ms. Tapas Fleming, a California licensed acupuncturist, the underlying idea claims that unresolved emotional trauma leads to a blockage of the natural flow of putative energy. Practitioners of TAT claim that self application of light pressure to four areas of the head (inner corner of both eyes, one-half-inch above the space between the eyebrows, and the back of head) while placing attention on a series of verbal steps releases this blockage and allows for healing. TAT was originally intended to be an allergy elimination protocol, however the emphasis switched to emotional trauma after the first few patients to experience this technique reported that a resolution of unresolved trauma was more prevalent than allergy relief.
A preliminary unblinded feasibility study comparing Tapas Acupressure Technique to Qigong or self-directed support for weight loss maintenance suggested that TAT might outperform the other methods studied. The results were not statistically significant.[3][4] A 500-member randomized trial of TAT versus standard weightloss management intervention funded by the NCCAM is slated for completion in 2011.[5]
No scientifically plausible method of action is proposed for Tapas Acupressure Technique, instead relying on unvalidated putative energy and meridians with no identified biophysical or histological basis. A 2005 review of so-called "Power Therapies" concluded that TAT and similar techniques "offered no new scientifically valid theories of action, show only non-specific efficacy, show no evidence that they offer substantive improvements to extant psychiatric care, yet display many characteristics consistent with pseudoscience."[2] TAT also conforms to the "nine practices of pseudoscience" as identified by AR Pratkins.[6]