Consciousness and the Placebo Effect Essay -- Biology Essays Research

Consciousness and the Placebo Effect In controlled studies, experimenters use placebos as medium to compare the efficacy of a drug. Double-blind controlled studies provide information on whether a drug is effective or if it is not better than placebo. The results of double-blind studies usually depict the latter. Rarely are drugs found to be significantly more effective than placebo because of the placebo effect. The phenomenal effectiveness of the placebo in controlled experiments is mind boggling. Experimenters can not fully understand the etiology of the placebo effect in relation to the nervous system but they have proposed plausible suggestions to the underlying mechanisms involved. An intriguing question raised is the placebo's ability to cure numerous symptoms. I hypothesize that the level of consciousness or alertness of the I-function, within the individual, may be the deciding factor in whether the placebo effect occurs. The objective of a placebo is to compare and assure that a new drug or operational procedure is effective. In experiments, the placebo is an inactive substance or procedure used as a control in an experiment (1). The placebo looks, tastes or feels just like the actual treatment (2). A false procedure for example, may consist of advising a person that he/she will be operated on and then making an incision into a person without operating. Subjects are advised of their probability of receiving actual treatment in order to maintain the expectation level of the participants. The efficacy of making an incision maintains the expectation level of the subject because the presence of a scar raises their belief that they were placed in the actual treatment group. Whether the placebo is a 'sugar pill' or an... ...) Alternative and Complementary Therapies: The Placebo Effect http://www.cancer.org/alt_therapies/articles/placebo.html 3) Alpha Omega Pain Medicine Associates: Placebo Power , date: 4/18/99 http://www.painmasters.com/ 4) Healthline Magazine: Placebo Effects on Pain , date: 4/18/99 http://www.health-line.com/articles/hl950404.htm 5) The Reward System, by Aryeh Routtenberg (located on N & B Reserve) 6) Thalamocortical Aspects of Consciousness From the Perspective of a Neurobiologist , date: 5/5/99 http://www.phil.vt.edu/assc/newman/grace.html 7) Why It Must Be Consciousness- For Real ! http://www.phil.vt.edu/assc/newman/baars.html 8)Other Links 9)Mind/Brain/Behavior The Pleasing Placebo http://www.med.harvard.edu/publications/Focus/Jan20_1995/Mind.html 10)What's the Placebo Effect? http://www.oakland.edu/~djcarlst/abx_plac.htm