Pain: Placebo Effect Critique

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  • Created by: Psych951
  • Created on: 07-01-19 16:54

Pain: Placebo Effect Critique

Advantages

  • 30% of chronic pain sufferers experience relief after placebo
  • Interactive theories understand placebo effects as an active process and focuses on mechanisms behind it
  • Placebos have been shown to mimic the effect of endorphins, providing support for a physiological component
  • Many theories can explain the role of patient expectations, from a learning, cognitive, emotional and physiological perspective
  • Mimics the effects of the 'study drug' and so provides a cheaper, possibly healthier, way to gain the same effects

Disadvantages

  • Issues with definitions e.g. what is a specific effect? Are psychological treatments providing a real or placebo effect?
  • Little evidence for individual characteristics predicting placebo responses
  • Non-interactive theories assume factors work in isolation and often ignore the other factors
  • Cognitive dissonance argues that dissonance and justification drives placebo, not expectations

Evaluation

Placebos clearly have an effect on the pain experience and can be explained by many interacting mechanisms, however issues with the definition limit its use as a treatment

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