A four-week pre-bedtime ritual combining scented skin care and self-massage improved perceived sleep and anxiety, but preliminary research could not pinpoint which factors caused the effect.
Image credit: Prostock-studio / Shutterstock
Recent preliminary research has been accepted for publication in a journal scientific reportResearchers from Chanel Parfums Beauté and collaborating institutions in France evaluated the effects of a combination of nighttime beauty routines and self-massage on sleep quality in healthy women who self-reported sleep problems.
Sleep disorders are an important public health problem, affecting an estimated 10% to 25% of adults, and are exacerbated by compulsive internet use and other new technologies. Sleep dysfunction negatively impacts social and health outcomes. Lack of sleep can reduce motivation and performance, increase fatigue and increase the risk of accidents. In recent years, there has been increased interest in non-pharmacological approaches to promoting better sleep.
Education about optimal sleep hygiene through behavioral and lifestyle interventions is a common approach to achieving long-term improvements in sleep. Additionally, aromatherapy, massage, and mindfulness-based stress reduction are promising approaches to reduce alertness and stress. Although massage therapy has sleep-related beneficial effects on a wide range of clinical conditions, the effects of self-massage on sleep in non-clinical populations remain understudied.
About research
In this preliminary, non-randomized study, researchers investigated the effectiveness of an evening beauty routine with self-massage on sleep quality in healthy women. Employed women aged 25 to 45 years with sleep disorders such as nocturnal awakenings, non-restorative sleep, long sleep latency, and Fitzpatrick skin phototypes I to VI were recruited. Participants had healthy skin and occasionally used body cosmetics. Subjects were non-randomly assigned to test or control groups based on their willingness to use the wearable device and the possibility of additional study visits.
All participants completed a lifestyle questionnaire and were asked to maintain their usual exercise, diet, and beauty routines. The test group was required to wear the ring throughout the study and was instructed to follow a new nightly beauty routine that involved self-massage after a 7-day baseline period. Specifically, I applied a body cream and face serum scented with light floral notes, mostly vanilla, for 10 minutes, following a pre-bedtime self-massage procedure. Meanwhile, air traffic controllers maintained their normal routine.
All participants completed a home-based questionnaire regarding daytime sleepiness, health-related quality of life (HRQoL), sleep quality, and anxiety. Daytime sleepiness was assessed using the Epworth Sleepiness Scale. The state subscale of the State Trait Anxiety Inventory was used to measure anxiety levels. HRQoL was measured using two domains of the 36-item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36): vitality and mental health.
Subjective sleep quality was assessed using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI). Objective sleep quality was measured using exploratory Oura Ring data collected from the test group only. Results obtained from the wearable include sleep efficiency, sleep latency, time in bed (TIB), number of awakenings, total sleep time (TST), deep sleep time, light sleep time, heart rate, and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Repeated measures analysis of variance was used to analyze results across multiple time points.
Scheme of experimental procedure in control and test groups. D0 to D30 = duration of cosmetic routine. D, experimental day, PSQI, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index. SF-36, Health-Related Quality of Life.
Survey results
The study involved 60 women with an average age of 36.5 years. Of these, 31 and 29 participants were assigned to the test and control groups, respectively. Both groups had similar proportions of participants who were perimenopausal and who were using hormonal contraceptives. At baseline, 62.7% of participants had poor sleep quality, 33.9% felt excessively sleepy during the day, and 33.9% had state anxiety scores above the study’s clinical symptom threshold.
After 4 weeks, the test group showed a greater decline in overall PSQI scores than controls. In particular, the PSQI sleep latency component improved in the test group compared to the control group, whereas the control group’s self-reported habitual sleep efficiency scores worsened. Beauty self-massage habits had no effect on daytime sleepiness. Self-reported mental health and vitality, assessed by two SF-36 domains, were significantly improved in the study group compared to the control group.
State anxiety scores were significantly decreased in the test group compared to the control group. In another exploratory analysis limited to the test group, wearable ring data showed some within-group changes from baseline. Total sleep time and estimated deep sleep time significantly increased by 22.5 and 11.1 minutes, respectively, on rest days, whereas bedtime showed a nonsignificant increase of approximately 26 minutes. However, not all wearable changes imply improved sleep. The number of awakenings on rest days also increased by 0.7 times. During the workday, estimated REM sleep time decreased by 8.6 minutes. Average heart rate decreased significantly during the night, regardless of whether it was a work day or a rest day.
conclusion
In summary, participants who applied cosmetics while self-massaging each night for four weeks reported improved sleep quality, mental health, vitality, and perceived state of anxiety compared to controls. Exploratory wearable data from the test group showed increases in total sleep time and estimated deep sleep time on rest days, but these changes could not be compared to those in the control group. These findings suggest that an evening beauty routine combined with self-massage may be a viable complementary component of sleep hygiene education.
In particular, the lack of blinding and randomization may have introduced selection bias and expectation effects. Because participants were also aware of the cosmetic brand and the study did not include a placebo, massage-only, cosmetics-only, or fragrance-only group, it was impossible to determine which elements of the combined routine contributed to the results. Additionally, the wearable ring was only used by the test group for logistical reasons. Therefore, wearable-derived metrics should be considered exploratory and interpreted with caution.
This study was not preregistered, and changes in subjective sleep measures were not significantly correlated with changes in wearable measures. The small sample size, 4-week duration, inclusion of only women, and recruitment of healthy participants with subjective sleep problems further limit the generalizability of the results.
Chanel Parfums Beauté funded this study, and the five authors were employees of Chanel. Overall, the findings contribute to the growing role of behavioral habits in sleep health. Further randomized, blinded, and well-controlled studies are needed to confirm these results and elucidate the underlying mechanisms.
Reference magazines:
- Porcheron A, Deletre M, Latreille J et al. (2026). Effect of an evening beauty routine with self-massage on sleep quality: A preliminary study. scientific report. Doi: 10.1038/s41598-026-60522-w, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-026-60522-w
