The Placebo Effect Is Getting Stronger, and Nobody Fully Knows Why
An analysis of pain-drug trials found the placebo response grew over two decades, mostly in the U.S. What does that say about belief and the body?
A 2015 analysis of clinical trials for neuropathic pain, published in the journal Pain, found that the gap between drug and placebo narrowed between 1990 and 2013, largely because placebo responses grew. The trend was concentrated in U.S. trials.
Researchers suspect that longer, larger and more elaborate trials raise expectations. For anyone curious about consciousness, it’s a reminder that what we expect is part of what we experience.
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