SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Personality and Social Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1547802
This article is part of the Research TopicExploring Effects of Group and Partnership Dynamics in Dance on Mental and Physical HealthView all 10 articles
Effect of Dance on Social Physique Anxiety and Physical Selfesteem among Adults: A systematic review
Provisionally accepted
- 1Putra Malaysia University, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia
- 2School of Physical Education, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang 212100, China
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Background: Physical activity has been widely recognized for its positive impact on mental health. Dance, as a form of physical activity, has garnered increasing attention in recent years.Existing literature suggests that dance specifically contributes to enhancing physical well-being and promoting emotional development. This systematic review aims to assess the impact of dance on social physique anxiety and physical self-esteem in adults.Method: A systematic literature search was conducted across multiple academic databases, including Embase, EBSCOhost, Cochrane, Scopus, PubMed, and Web of Science. The data were then systematically reviewed using the PRISMA guidelines. The quality of each study's appraisal was evaluated using the PEDro scale.Results: Sixteen studies examined the effects of seven types of dances-Zumba, Latin dance, Salsa, Dance Movement Therapy, Aerobic dance, Belly dance, and Colombian Caribbean Folk dance-on adult's social physique anxiety and physical self-esteem. The participants in this review included adults, college students and older adults (ages range from 18 to 76). The quality appraisal scores on the PEDro scale ranged from 3 to 6. Dance interventions were found to significantly enhance physical self-esteem and self-confidence, while concurrently reducing social physique anxiety and negative self-evaluation in an enjoyable manner.This review indicates that dance positively affected social physique anxiety and physical self-esteem for experimental groups that participated in dance compared to control groups in the reviewed studies. These effects were consistent across all age groups. Moreover, the study demonstrates that female participants in the experimental groups experienced more significant improvements in physical self-esteem and greater reductions in social physique anxiety levels compared to male participants. Trial Registration: https:// www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero, [CRD42022315034].
Keywords: Psychology, dance, Anxiety, self-esteem, Mental Health, Adult
Received: 18 Dec 2024; Accepted: 12 May 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Liu, Soh and Lu. 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:
Xutao Liu, Putra Malaysia University, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia
Yingjie Lu, Putra Malaysia University, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia
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