The use of touch for the treatment of psychiatric disorders is increasingly investigated, as it is shown that cognitive symptoms can be improved by various forms of massage. To investigate if the effect of massage is measurable using classical visual event-related potential components (P1, P2, late positive potential (LPP)), we performed a preliminary study on six participants using myofascial induction massage. Participants were shown emotionally valenced or neutral images before and after a 20 min myofascial massage. We found general increases in P2 amplitude following the intervention across all conditions (both neutral and affective), indicating increased attention or salience to visual stimuli. The magnitude of change was visibly larger for unpleasant stimuli, suggesting that visual perception and attention were modulated specifically in response to unpleasant visual images. The LPP showed reductions in amplitude after myofascial massage, suggesting increased emotional modulation following intervention, as a result of possible DMN alterations, consistent with region and function. We conclude that brief myofascial intervention supports other research in the field, finding that physical touch and massage techniques can alter cognition and perception. We posit further research to investigate its future use as an intervention for both physical and cognitive modulation. Importantly, we provide preliminary evidence that the neural processes that resonate with this type of massage involve complex feedforward and backward cortical pathways, of which a significant portion participate in modulating the visual perception of external stimuli.
Keywords: ERP; default mode network; emotion; massage; parasympathetic; perception; salience; touch.