Tanya | Week 12 | Mind Over Body
Imagine that you were just told that you’ve been exposed to something extremely toxic.
At first, you feel fine. More than fine, really, because those words are just words to you. They could never be reality.
But then, you start to notice small things and little changes in yourself. You start to notice that your breathing has become slightly uneven, and a bit shallow, without you realizing it. Suddenly your chest has become constricted and much tighter than it felt a couple of minutes ago. Maybe your head has started to ache, in a dull, distant way, until now it is pounding and pounding and there is quite literally not a single thing you could possibly do to make it stop.
These symptoms have appeared out of nowhere, and they definitely were not there a few minutes ago. You’re sure of that. But then once they have started, they are absolutely impossible to ignore. Which is also problematic, because the more you pay attention to them, the stronger they become until they consume you and you cannot focus on anything else.
And then, after hours of both mental and physical uneasiness, you learn that there was never even anything toxic that you were exposed to in the first place. Everything was safe, and you were fine, right up until you weren’t, all because your body was expecting those physical consequences and had already prepared for them.
There is a psychological concept known as the Nocebo Effect that can explain this, and I genuinely think that it is one of the strangest and most creepy, unsettling examples of the power of the human mind. More commonly known is the Placebo Effect, where one believes that a certain treatment or solution will help them, and they will feel better as a result. The Nocebo Effect is the complete opposite, because it states that a person can experience real, harmful side effects due to their own negative expectations or beliefs.
People who expect to see side effects from taking a medication will often end up experiencing those exact symptoms. A study was conducted to test this phenomenon where 49 people were asked to try a supposed anti-itch cream, which really did not contain any active ingredients. Participants were either given a more seemingly expensive fake medication, or a fake medication that was perceived as cheaper. Each of the participants was then given a small amount of one of the creams on their forearms, and they were told that the cream could lead to a heightened sensation of pain.
As it turned out, the participants who had received the more “expensive” cream rated their pain as significantly more intense than the rated pain of the participants who received the “cheaper” cream.
If this pain existed only in their heads, that would be one thing. However, analysis of the participants’ brain activity showed increased levels of activation in the prefrontal cortex of individuals with the expensive cream. This was only confirmed by images of their spinal cords: in regions of the spinal cord that are known to be associated with responding to pain, the participants who were given the expensive cream showed a lot more activation than other participants. These scientific findings proved that people truly can experience real pain as a result of preconceived expectations.
If our own minds have the power to make something entirely harmless feel so dangerous, then maybe not all of our experiences are as true as we like to believe. If a single suggestion or implication is enough to cause actual pain out of nothing at all, then I really can’t help but wonder how much of what we feel is actually real, and how much of it is because of our own delusions.
The label only hinted at harm, but the mind listened anyway.
Naturally, the body cannot do anything but obey.
Image Credit: https://www.forbes.com/sites/traversmark/2023/12/10/a-psychologist-explains-the-nocebo-effect-and-how-to-avoid-it/
Tanya, to be honest, I was a little lost when I first began reading your blog. I believe that your hook came to fruition very well, as I was surprised and intrigued to read your reference to the infamous placebo effect. I, for one, have had my fair share of experience with the placebo effect, but I have yet to experience it for myself. I have read about it countless times, as the College Board adores the concept so much that it appears in nearly every unit of the course. I, however, have only been educated and informed on the positive consequences of the placebo effect and was shocked to discover that it can have detrimental effects on an individual's physical and mental health. This makes me wonder if other individuals have abused the negative powers of the placebo effect, and maybe we have used it on ourselves. Could it be possible, as we walk into a test and expect it to be difficult, that we actually make it harder than it is? Regardless, I found your blog a little dark but enrapturing. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteThe last time I experienced the placebo effect was when a close friend of mine dislocated her elbow late last year doing a project at my rock climbing gym. I wasn’t there for the actual accident, but when she was leaving and clutching her elbow, I couldn’t help but feel a phantom pain of my own in my elbow as well. The placebo effect is a well-documented phenomenon, and for me, at least, it shows how susceptible we are to persuasion.
ReplyDeletePerhaps there’s some value in the statement “your thoughts create your reality,” as William Knight stated. Even though ideas and beliefs are not tangible, their direct impact on reality is. The Red Scare or the Salem witch trials, for example, that we learned about in class demonstrate the power that ideas can have on masses of people. The placebo effect is a more watered-down and harmless form of mass hysteria—perhaps useful only to advertisers aiming to sell expensive, benign anti-itch cream.
It is truly unsettling to think that our bodies of protecting ourselves from harm(pain) can be easily deceived. Not only pain, what about our other senses? The way we see anything right now is through the information collected through our sensory organs, but that is still being interpreted by our brain. And if our brain can be so easily tricked into thinking something, then that could also apply to everything else as well. Maybe, we are all captured by aliens and are forced to live through our memories while they suckle at our life force; you never know!
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing Tanya!