The Placebo Effect (The Skeptic's Dictionary)

[bjornart]

THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND PLAYS A KEY ROLE IN THE PLACEBO EFFECT

http://myscienceacademy.org/2012/09/11/the-unconscious-mind-plays-a-key-role-in-the-placebo-effect/

You don't need to be aware of an expectation of improvement for the placebo effect to happen. - Unsurprising

A psychologist uses pseudo-scientific babble "It is, in other words, a level of quantum reality." - Unsurprising

Things happening in the brain-body outside of cognitive awareness are perfectly compatible with a materialistic analysis. Using it to imply anything about mind-matter duality, even witout the preeminent woo-marker that misusing "quantum" is, is inane.

 

[Mojo]

Here's something I wrote elsewhere:

Sometimes, “placebo effect” is used as shorthand for “any improvement not attributable to an active intervention” – this improvement could be due to a number of factors. When used in this way, the term does cover the true placebo effect, but it also includes the following: "Spontaneous improvement, fluctuation of symptoms, regression to the mean, additional treatment, conditional switching of placebo treatment, scaling bias, irrelevant response variables, answers of politeness, experimental subordination, conditioned answers, neurotic or psychotic misjudgment, psychosomatic phenomena, misquotation, etc." [Kienle and Kiene, 1997]

The big problem with this is that it causes the placebo effect to be confused with all these other factors, many of which are not anything to do with the administration of the treatment. People then manage to misinterpret "this treatment works no better than placebo" as meaning "this treatment works via the placebo effect", and argue for its use on this basis.

 

[Mojo]

THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND PLAYS A KEY ROLE IN THE PLACEBO EFFECT

http://myscienceacademy.org/2012/09/11/the-unconscious-mind-plays-a-key-role-in-the-placebo-effect/

Much of medicine is based on what is considered the strongest possible evidence: The placebo-controlled trial. A paper published in the October 19 issue of Annals of Internal Medicine — entitled “What’s In Placebos: Who Knows?” calls into question this foundation upon which much of medicine rests, by showing that there is no standard behind the standard — no standard for the placebo.

Why should there be a standard for placebos? All a placebo is is a convincing dummy treatment, so its nature will be determined entirely by the nature of the treatment being investigated. The only important criterion is that the placebo should be indistinguishable from the treatment itself.

 

[Zeuzzz]

Why should there be a standard for placebos? All a placebo is is a convincing dummy treatment, so its nature will be determined entirely by the nature of the treatment being investigated. The only important criterion is that the placebo should be indistinguishable from the treatment itself.

No.

The criterion is the personal belief of the person taking it.

If they believe it will work, it more likely will.

If they are too skeptical, it likely wont.

Easy difference. Supported by a lot of psycho-pharmacolgy publications.

 

[Kid Eager]

No.

The criterion is the personal belief of the person taking it.

If they believe it will work, it more likely will.

If they are too skeptical, it likely wont.

Easy difference. Supported by a lot of psycho-pharmacolgy publications.

That doesn't address the post quoted - that the alleged absence of a standard for placebos is an irrelevance.

 

[Jomante]

Interestingly, one study shows that the placebo effect works even if the person knows it is a placebo. Deception is not necessary.

So obviously it must be magic

 

[Mojo]

No.

The criterion is the personal belief of the person taking it.

If they believe it will work, it more likely will.

If they are too skeptical, it likely wont.

Easy difference. Supported by a lot of psycho-pharmacolgy publications.

The part of the article you linked to that I quoted was calling the validity of the placebo controlled trial into question bacause there is "no standard for the placebo".

You cannot have a standardised placebo for use in controlled trials because something that is a convincing placebo for one intervention will not necessarily be a convincing placebo for another. A pill isn't going to be a convincing placebo for acupuncture, for example. Even if the intervention being tested is a pill, a pill of a different colour is not going to be an adequate placebo.

The nature of the placebo used in a placebo controlled trial needs to be determined by the nature of the particular intervention, because the placebo needs to be indistinguishable from the treatment.