Nocebo effects in health psychology

Health psychology and health promotion

Health psychology is the defined as studying of psychological and behavioral processes in health, illness, and healthcare. It contributes to is concerned with the understanding of how psychological, behavioral, and cultural factors contribute role to in physical health and illness. Psychological factors can affect health directly. For example, health is hurt by the chronically occurring environ...

The role of learning in nocebo and placebo effects.

The nocebo effect consists in delivering verbal suggestions of negative outcomes so that the subject expects clinical worsening. Here we show that nocebo suggestions, in which expectation of pain increase is induced, are capable of producing both hyperalgesic and allodynic responses. By extending previous findings on the placebo effect, we investigated the role of learning in the nocebo effect ...

Health effects of viewing landscapes – Landscape types in environmental psychology

The visible landscape is believed to affect human beings in many ways, including aesthetic appreciation and health and well-being. The aim of this paper is to analyse the range of landscapes used in environmental psychology studies, and the evidence of health effects related to viewing these landscapes. A literature review of publications linking landscapes and health effects was conducted. Thi...

Nocebo effects in clinical studies: hints for pain therapy

INTRODUCTION Nocebo-induced algesic responses occurring within clinical contexts present a challenge for health care practitioners working in the field of pain medicine. OBJECTIVES Following the recent research on algesic nocebo effects, the scope of this review is to develop ethically acceptable strategies to help avoid, or at least reduce, nocebo responses within clinical settings. METHOD...

Health psychology.