Breaking news: the rise of ‘smash hit’ rage rooms

Goggles ready, sledgehammer steady, go smash that TV! Booking a “rage room” – in which you can let out your anger by breaking furniture – is the new stress release for anyone feeling “a bit wound up” by “the state of the world”, said Channel 4.

Thought to have originated in Japan in the late 2000s, the pay-to-destroy concept is gaining great popularity in the UK – although experts are divided about how effective it can be at venting pent-up anger.

Release of ‘complex emotion’

In a rage room, you can smash as many items as your heart desires. Typical 30-minute sessions cost between £35 and £70, although some slots can rise to £200, depending on the size of the room and the number of items up for smashing.

They have been “touted” as a great way to “alleviate stress”, said the BBC. Customers, wearing protective gear, are handed an implement, and left to wreak havoc on old pieces of furniture, washing machines, ceramics and old electronic equipment. There are now venues “where people are handed a baseball bat and let loose” in London, Brighton, Cardiff, Belfast and Glasgow.

Rage rooms are even prescribed by some health professionals. “People are being referred to us from GPs, psychiatrists and charities”, as a safe and controlled way to release complex emotion, rage room owner Amelia Smewing told ITV.

However, some experts are sceptical about the benefits. “It feels good, so people assume it’s good for them,” Ryan Martin, a professor of psychology and author of several books on anger, told The Guardian. But the evidence suggests that people who rely on bursts of venting tend to stay angrier for longer, and are more likely to lash out aggressively. Sophie Kjærvik of the Norwegian Center for Violence and Traumatic Stress Studies has found that “meditation and mindfulness and muscle relaxation activities are way more productive ways of dealing with anger”.

Women can ‘let it out’

One of the main reasons rage rooms have become a “smash hit” is their “popularity among women”, said The Times. At The Activity Dome in Weston-super-Mare, for example, where there has been a 150% surge in reservations, around 90% of customers are women.

From an early age, women “are often discouraged from expressing overt anger”, leading them to “internalise” it, Fraser Smith, of MAPP Psychology, told the paper. Many women are “at breaking point, permanently teetering, living in survival mode”, rage room owner Lucy Bee told The Guardian. “And this gives them a way to just let it out”. It can often be a “gateway towards seeking further help”.