I went wild swimming in a chilly river and haven’t had a panic attack since
theguardian.com
theguardian.com
I would be very interested in them if it worked, but it sounds so hokey.
Even though it sounds like hippie bullshit, he accidentally stumbled onto a huge body hack to control his autonomous nervous system. It has also been validated in studies. It's also impossible to ignore all the extreme cold things he's done without getting frostbite.
https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/wim-hof-the-iceman/
This guy went to go debunk him, but instead ended up following the method and climbed a mountain with him in winter in the nude.
Gordon Pugh is another example of people who have developed an amazing ability to deal with cold. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6... .
The linked-to article doesn't mention breathing exercises nor meditation, so it seems to be a different protocol than Hof's.
To me, it seems like the author cherry picked those studies to support their conclusion, or it was written before additional studies came out that validate the physiology behind his method. Based on the date I'm going to say cherry picking. There are a few more listed on his own website, I was going to use that as a citation but was trying to use a neutral source.
https://www.wimhofmethod.com/science
I didn't know about Gordon Pugh, thanks for sharing.
One thing I noticed was it was meant to show that people who followed Hof's training had several measurable differences to those who did not.
What it doesn't do resolve if all three parts of Hof's training ("meditation, exposure to cold, and breathing techniques") were essential. The article in The Guardian seems to suggest that these aren't all needed, albeit only because two of them weren't mentioned. [1]
I also noticed that the nine people who did the training also went to Poland, while the control group did not. That means the study cannot exclude the possibility that air travel, the food they ate, or other shared factors had an effect on the result.
[1] I came across https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S096522992... - "A systematic review and meta-analysis of the effect of whole body cryotherapy on mental health problems" - which suggests the benefits primarily come from the temperature.
It ends as you suggested: "Results indicate preliminary evidence for WBC as efficacious add-on intervention for mental health problems, especially depressive symptoms. Further research in the form of RCTs with larger numbers of participants is needed." :)