Health Psychology : a Textbook

correlation between high anxiety levels and increased pain perception in children with migraines and sufferers of back pain and ...

components: (i) rumination: a focus on threatening information both internal and external (‘I can feel my neck click whenever I ...

pain experience. For example, in the experimental study described above, James and Hardardottir (2002) illustrated this associat ...

interchangeable. For example, emotional factors may influence an individual’s physi- ology and cognitive factors may influence a ...

their bodily functions. Biofeedback aims to decrease anxiety and tension and there- fore to decrease pain. However, some researc ...

sources such as the emotions associated with the pain (‘I am anxious that it will never go away’); physiological sources such as ...

effectiveness for other pain related problems or for outcomes other than pain severity and frequency. Psychological factors can ...

Enhance outcome efficacy. If patients have previously received several forms of pain treatment, they may believe that nothing ...

Functional limitation: the subjects also included measures of things they could not do within the 14 days.
Pain medication: ...

Results The results were analysed to examine differences between the two groups (treatment versus control) and to examine differ ...

drug with the effects of simply taking something. However, placebos have been shown to have an effect on pain relief. Beecher (1 ...

MEASURING PAIN Whether it is to examine the causes or consequences of pain or to evaluate the effective- ness of a treatment for ...

are sometimes used as an index of pain intensity. Such measures include an assess- ment of inflammation and measures of sweating ...

ASSUMPTIONS IN HEALTH PSYCHOLOGY The research into pain highlights some of the assumptions underlying health psychology. 1 The m ...

➧ Weinsenberg, M. (1987) Psychological intervention for the control of pain, Behaviour Research and Therapy, 25: 301–12. This pa ...

13 Placebos and the interrelationship between beliefs, behaviour and health CHAPTER OVERVIEW The study of placebos is a good ill ...

This chapter covers: ➧ What is a placebo? ➧ How do placebos work? ➧ The central role of patient expectations ➧ Cognitive dissona ...

WHAT IS A PLACEBO? Placebos have been defined as follows:
Inert substances which cause symptom relief (e.g. ‘My headache went ...

treatments are still believed in. Perhaps, the maintenance of faith both in these interven- tions and in the people carrying out ...

examine individual characteristics, characteristics of the treatment and characteristics of the health professional, or interact ...