PURPOSE OF REVIEW The placebo literature has substantially increased in 2006 and 2007, and more and more medical and psychological subspecialties have added empirical data to our knowledge. RECENT FINDINGS The theoretical framework of our understanding of the placebo response needs extension to account for findings that cannot be attributed to (Pavlovian) conditioning or suggestions alone. In...

Conflicting data and misunderstanding of placebo and nocebo phenomena are essential components of the great scandal related to the treatment of depressive disorders. This scandal has two opposite aspects: glorification and vilification, contradictory estimates about under-prescription and over-prescription of antidepressant drugs. More than twenty years ago, Cassano (1992) cautioned that “depre...