The Placebo Effect

[PatrickHenry]

I'm sure you folks are familiar with this concept, but the explanations are mostly theories, aren't they?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Placebo_effect

The placebo effect (also known as non-specific effects) is the phenomenon that a patient's symptoms can be alleviated by an otherwise ineffective treatment, apparently because the individual expects or believes that it will work. Some people consider this to be a remarkable aspect of human physiology; others consider it to be an illusion arising from the way medical experiments were conducted; others still consider the concept to be a roundabout form of denial that mankind has a spiritual nature.

[Starboy]

I was reading some report that I can't remember where that discussed experiments involving the placebo effect. What they were able to show is that areas of the brain involved in percieving and controlling pain are affected by the perception of how painful the experience should be. That this response is tied to the placebo effect. I can't find the original article and I do not recall the details. If I come across it I'll post more.

Starboy

[gallo]

Quote by: PatrickHenry I'm sure you folks are familiar with this concept, but the explanations are mostly theories, aren't they?

Wouldn't it be nice if you used the word theory with the correct scientific connotation on a board that deals with science? Why use "theory" to mean wild guess on a board where it is usually taken to mean well tested explanation for observed facts? Or is it that you don't actually know what the word theory means in a scientific context? I'll give you a hint - it doesn't mean guesswork.

[SteveA]

Quote by: Starboy I was reading some report that I can't remember where that discussed experiments involving the placebo effect. What they were able to show is that areas of the brain involved in percieving and controlling pain are affected by the perception of how painful the experience should be. That this response is tied to the placebo effect. I can't find the original article and I do not recall the details. If I come across it I'll post more. Starboy

It's advantageous and increases the learning rate from a pleasure/pain system to be able to predict future pleasure/pain from your actions without actually needing to experience it.

As a quick example, there was a machine taught to balance a stick. It only had a feedback that told it when the stick had completely fallen, but the algorithm that learned how to balance it included a method to learn to predict when it was close to falling. The actual penality input was swapped with the future prediction for pain instead and it was able to balance the broom because it didn't have to actually wait for it to fall before knowing things were going in the wrong direction. (Just like people don't actually need to get into a car accident to have a close call frighten them and discourage repeating the close encounter in the future)

That wouldn't explain much why real physical differences would occur from placebos, but it could explain people 'feeling' better if they believed the medicine would help. (There is a tradeoff though)

[Starboy]

Here it is:

Quote by: Science New - Week of July 2, 2005; Vol. 168, No. 1 , p. 13 Placebo gives brain emotional break Bruce Bower The placebo effect, in which people experience health benefits from inactive medications, thrives on great expectations. According to a new study of placebo-induced reduction of anxiety, such expectations trigger a decline in the brain's emotional responsiveness and marshal pain-numbing neural activity. A team led by Predrag Petrovic of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm tested 15 women over 2 days. On the first day, each volunteer used a scale of 1 to 100 to rate the unpleasantness of pictures presented to her. For example, a picture of severely injured people got high rankings and a landscape ranked low. Participants then received low intravenous doses of an antianxiety drug and rated the images a second time. Finally, the women rated the same images after receiving intravenous doses of a substance that blocked the antianxiety drug's effects. With the antianxiety treatment, they viewed the images with less unease the images that they had previously rated as highly unpleasant. With the blocker of the antianxiety drug, the women's' ratings duplicated their initial ones. The next day, the experiment was repeated, with a placebo twist. Volunteers were told they would get the same two drugs, but they instead received intravenous saline. Unpleasantness ratings in each condition closely corresponded to ratings from the previous day, Petrovic and his coworkers report in the June 16 Neuron. A functional magnetic resonance imaging scanner measured blood flow—a sign of neural activity—in each woman's brain during the placebo experiments. When a placebo eased distress at seeing disturbing images, activity in brain areas linked to emotion died down. Moreover, regions previously implicated in pain relief from placebos perked up, the researchers note.

Petrovic, P., et al. 2005. Placebo in emotional processing—induced expectations of anxiety relief activate a generalized modulatory network. Neuron 46(June 16):957-969. Abstract available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2005.05.023.

Starboy

[PatrickHenry]

Quote by: gallo Wouldn't it be nice if you used the word theory with the correct scientific connotation on a board that deals with science? Why use "theory" to mean wild guess on a board where it is usually taken to mean well tested explanation for observed facts? Or is it that you don't actually know what the word theory means in a scientific context? I'll give you a hint - it doesn't mean guesswork.

Sorry, gallo. I didn't mean a "wild guess," more like a bundle of hypotheses. And they are not at all consistent are they? No need for the scorn...

[gallo]

Quote by: PatrickHenry more like a bundle of hypotheses.

Then they aren't theories, are they?

Quote by: PatrickHenry No need for the scorn...

I guess I was influenced by your history here.

[PatrickHenry]

Quote by: gallo I guess I was influenced by your history here.

My history is one of questioning things. You, OTOH, are often a scornful debater.

[Starboy]

Quote by: PatrickHenry My history is one of questioning things. You, OTOH, are often a scornful debater.

Really? I've never seen you question your own superstition.

Starboy

[PatrickHenry]

Quote by: Starboy Really? I've never seen you question your own superstition.

You seem quite confident of your positions also. Is that a positive trait?

[Jack]

Anyway...

Isn't there an element of "predetermined expectation" involved in the placebo effect as well? If I expect a certain result, my mind and body are likely to reinterpret evidence until it conforms to my expectations. This could explain we we think prayer and positive thinking actually produce results. In a way they so, but only because of skewed interpretations of preconceived expectations.

[Starboy]

Quote by: PatrickHenry You seem quite confident of your positions also. Is that a positive trait?

And what position is that? Who said anything about positive. I was responding to your statement. Wassamater? Does your imperfection require my perfection? I could be the scum of the earth, it still doesn't let you or your fellow Christians off the hook.

Starboy

[PatrickHenry]

Quote by: Starboy I could be the scum of the earth, it still doesn't let you or your fellow Christians off the hook.

What does that have to do with the placebo effect? Mind if we stay with the topic? Every thread doesn't need to morph into an anti-Christian screed does it?

[Starboy]

Quote by: PatrickHenry What does that have to do with the placebo effect? Mind if we stay with the topic? Every thread doesn't need to morph into an anti-Christian screed does it?

So now you want to debate the topic? Ha! What was that non-topic crack coming from you that started this little side note?

Starboy

[PatrickHenry]

Quote by: Starboy So now you want to debate the topic? Ha! What was that non-topic crack coming from you that started this little side note? Starboy

Yeah, yeah. Sometimes things go off, but it's good to stay less personal and on-topic.

[5010]

I wonder how many physiological problems are associated with fear. Faith is the enemy of fear. A placebo works by faith.

For instance, if a patient experiences stress, which causes a medical problem, which the patient worries will get worse, which causes stress. Here you have a chronic cycle resulting from an acute event. I can see where a placebo would help break the cycle.