The Acute Side Effects of Bright Light Therapy: A Placebo-Controlled Investigation

Title: The Acute Side Effects of Bright Light Therapy: A Placebo-Controlled Investigation Authors: Botanov, Yevgeny; Ilardi, Stephen S. Abstract: Despite the emergence of numerous clinical and non-clinical applications of bright light therapy (LT) in recent decades, the prevalence and severity of LT side effects have not yet been fully explicated. A few adverse LT effects—headache, eye strain, irritability, and nausea—have been consistently reported among depressed individuals and other psychiatric cohorts, but there exists little published evidence regarding LT side effects in non-clinical populations, who often undergo LT treatment of considerably briefer duration. Accordingly, in the present study we examined, in a randomized sample of healthy young adults, the acute side effects of exposure to a single 30-minute session of bright white light (10,000 lux) versus dim red light (