{"id":14609,"date":"2012-09-18T15:58:12","date_gmt":"2012-09-18T22:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/?page_id=14609"},"modified":"2015-08-17T15:10:03","modified_gmt":"2015-08-17T22:10:03","slug":"placebo-effect","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/placebo-effect\/","title":{"rendered":"Placebo Effect"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"TwoThe placebo effect<\/strong><\/span> occurs when a person reports an improvement in symptoms after taking a medication that contains no ingredients that should cause symptom improvement. The effect requires that a person believes that the medication will work. For example, a person with depression who is given a sugar pill and is told that the medication is an antidepressant<\/a> may report an improvement in their depression<\/a>. A related effect, the nocebo effect, occurs when a person believes a substance will harm them and then reports negative symptoms.<\/p>\n

Experiments Involving Placebos<\/strong><\/h2>\n

In experiments testing medications, subjects are frequently divided into three groups:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. One group receives no treatment<\/li>\n
  2. The second group receives the medication being tested<\/li>\n
  3. The third group receives a placebo such as a sugar pill<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Experimenters typically compare the results of the placebo group to the medication group to determine how much improvement is attributable to the medication versus simply to a belief that the medication will work. Many drugs turn out to be only slightly more effective than placebos.<\/p>\n

    Mechanism<\/strong><\/h2>\n

    The placebo effect is directly related to a person\u2019s expectations. The more strongly a person believes in a medication\u2019s efficacy, the more significant the effect of the medication is likely to be. Brain imaging tests indicate that the use of a placebo may activate portions of the brain related to information processing. Thus, people who take placebos may view their symptoms differently or may become more motivated to feel better.<\/p>\n

    References:<\/strong><\/p>\n

      \n
    1. American Psychological Association. APA concise dictionary of psychology<\/em>. Washington, DC. American Psychological Association, 2009. Print.<\/li>\n
    2. Kring, A. M., Johnson, S. L., Davison, G. C., & Neale, J. M. (2010). Abnormal psychology<\/em>. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.<\/li>\n
    3. Placebo Effect. (n.d.).\u00a0 Scientific american<\/em>. Retrieved from http:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article.cfm?id=placebo-effect-a-cure-in-the-mind<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      The placebo effect occurs when a person reports an improvement in symptoms after taking a medication that contains no ingredients that should cause symptom improvement. The effect requires that a person believes that the medication will work. For example, a person with depression who is given a sugar pill and is told that the medication […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2474,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"psychpedia.php","meta":{"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-14609","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2474"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14609\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}