REVIEW article
Front. Psychiatry
Sec. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Rehabilitation
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2025.1680983
This article is part of the Research Topic15 Years of Frontiers in Psychiatry - Therapies, Treatments and RehabilitationView all articles
Donkey-assisted therapy in mental health conditions: A systematic review
Provisionally accepted
Alessia Fulgenzi1Antonio Raffa1
Carmela De Domenico1*
Marcella Di Cara1
Simona Leonardi1
Adriana Piccolo1Fabio Mauro Giambò1Giulia Marafioti1
Angelo Alito2Giulia Leonardi3
Laura Turriziani4Michele Panzera4Angelo Quartarone1
Francesca Cucinotta1- 1Bonino Pulejo Neurology Center (IRCCS), Messina, Italy
- 2Department of Biomedical, Dental Sciences and Morphological and Functional Images, University of Messina, Messina, Italy
- 3Physical Rehabilitation Medicine Department, University Hospital A.O.U. "G. Martino", Messina, Italy
- 4Centro Specializzato Universitario per gli InterventiAssistiti con gliAnimali, Università degli Studi di Messina, Messina, Italy
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Introduction: This paper evaluates the effectiveness of donkey-assisted therapy in neurodevelopmental disorders and in children, adolescents, and adults. Methods: Registered in the PROSPERO database (CRD42025644921) and conducted according to Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses, the review included studies from ScienceDirect (Elsevier), Web of Science, and PubMed (National Library of Medicine), searched up to 31 December 2024. The inclusion criteria were (a) pilot studies, randomized control studies, and uncontrolled clinical trials, (b) dealing with donkey-assisted interventions (DAI) in children, adolescents, and adults age, (c) in English, Italian, Spanish, or German languages. The exclusion criteria were: (a) clinical cases, pre-prints, letters to the editor, reviews, and systematic reviews; (b) studies involving therapies other than donkey-assisted therapy. Results: Four observational studies were included. The results suggest that donkey-assisted interventions, particularly donkey-assisted therapy, help improve emotional regulation, communication, social interaction, and self-esteem in children with neurodevelopmental disorders. Improvements in autonomy, motor coordination, and social engagement have been observed in adults. Conclusion: The heterogeneity of study methodologies, variations in sample size, assessment instruments, and intervention duration limit the generalizability of the results. Future research should focus on large-scale, well-controlled studies, standardizing protocols and outcome measures to quantify the therapeutic impact of DAI in diverse populations.
Keywords: animal-assistedintervention, Animal-assistedtherapy, Donkeytherapy, Neurodevelopmental disorders, psychiatric disorders
Received: 06 Aug 2025; Accepted: 03 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Fulgenzi, Raffa, De Domenico, Di Cara, Leonardi, Piccolo, Giambò, Marafioti, Alito, Leonardi, Turriziani, Panzera, Quartarone and Cucinotta. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Carmela De Domenico, carmela.dedomenico@irccsme.it
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