I remember years ago reading about some test where participants lived in a house next to a phone mast. For the first week the phone mast was off, then the next week they turned it on. In the second week a bunch of people complained about getting sick and one person even had to leave. Then it turned out they’d never actually turned it on, I guess to prove that these people were idiots.
Gottem
Submitted 4 days ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to science_memes@mander.xyz
https://mander.xyz/pictrs/image/533100bf-caf6-40ac-b681-1881551ed523.jpeg
Comments
twinnie@feddit.uk 4 days ago
faerbit@sh.itjust.works 3 days ago
I guess to prove that these people were idiots What an asinine statement under a comic about the placebo effect.
Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 days ago
People can be idiots for forming a firm belief that something can be bad for them when all evidence and expert opinion contradicts it, even whilst due to the nocebo effect that firm belief leads to them trully feeling bad.
There isn’t idiocy in feeling actual effects due to nothing else than a placebo or nocebo effect from than a strongly held belief, whilst there can be idiocy in the way one gains a belief so strong was that it actually triggers one of those effects.
So the example given by the previous poster does seem to fit a situation of people who are indeed idiots.
SlothMama@lemmy.world 4 days ago
Then he learned he was a diabetic and the sugar pills they gave as a placebo caused his blood sugar to rise enough to cause his symptoms
hector@lemmy.today 3 days ago
That’s not how placebo’s are done. If the researchers know whom is getting the placebo the results are worthless, hence the double blind part.
And the placebo effect is real, in some people, some of the time. They did one with pain pills (and also found different colors had a higher effect rate for different conditions,) and for pain pills after they were given the pills they were administered nalaxone, and opiate antagonist that forces those drugs off of the receptors and reverses their effects, and the pain relief of those both experiencing effects from the placebo and those feeling the opioids were reversed.
Strongly suggesting the placebo fooled their body into releasing it’s own endogenous opiates.
It was in a New Yorker article, The Power of Nothing, with a bunch of other interesting material:
www.newyorker.com/…/the-power-of-nothingQuibblekrust@thelemmy.club 2 days ago
Strongly suggesting the placebo fooled their body into releasing it’s own endogenous opiates.
I don’t get it. Why would they assume that? You’re given a placebo pain reliever and it relieves pain. Then you’re given a nalaxone, which you, the patient, knows blocks opioids. In both cases, it could just be the placebo effect. You could be given water and told it’s nalaxone, and it could have the same effect.
Were they not told they were being given nalaxone? Were there four cohorts? Were some of the people who got placebo painkillers also given placebo nalaxone where it didn’t block the pain relief?
I can’t read the paywalled article.
hector@lemmy.today 2 days ago
Huh that article never used to be paywalled sorry, there is a way to use archive to read it but it’s never worked for me.
Because the ones feeling the pain relief, that don’t know if they got the real drugs or placebo, are given naloxone and the effect is reversed. So they had opiates in their system that were blocked, but were not given any, meaning their body released the endogenous ones.
archive.ph/20221218222515/…/the-power-of-nothing
Let me know if that doesn’t work this is the first time I’ve actually done this, with a tool before I tried from archive and it never worked.
’
Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca 3 days ago
Wait, if the researchers don’t know who got the pal ebo but placebos can cause actual effects how do they know which effects are from the medication and which are from the placebo? If someone got a placebo and experienced headaches but no one on the medication did do they still have to warn that the medication may cause headaches?
webpack@ani.social 3 days ago
the study is setup so that the person taking the pill and the person giving it to the participant who is recording the results both don’t know whether the pill is a placebo, but some other person knows or it’s written somewhere else what the person got so in the end they can know if the result was from placebo. the important part is the researcher at the time of recording/interpreting doesn’t know, because if they know they may be bias in favor or against the placebo.
Malgas@beehaw.org 3 days ago
The people interacting with patients don’t know which is which, but somebody does.
The whole point is seeing if the drug is better than a placebo, so you definitely need that information when it’s time to analyze data.
samus12345@sh.itjust.works 3 days ago
Plot twist: the researchers were also part of the experiment and were told he was getting a placebo when he actually wasn’t!
Tempus_Fugit@lemmy.world 3 days ago
A double-blind double-cross if you will.
tetris11@feddit.uk 3 days ago
Was it reproduced
fckreddit@lemmy.ml 4 days ago
Why is this so silly and yet so funny?
MeowerMisfit817@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Science!
ProfessorProteus@lemmy.world 3 days ago
HugeNerd@lemmy.ca 3 days ago
“gottem”? It would be got 'em, and in this case, got 'im.
Tempus_Fugit@lemmy.world 3 days ago
What if this was a double-blind double-cross?
black_flag@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 days ago
In double-blind studies, the test administrators are made unaware which sample is real vs. placebo
ch00f@lemmy.world 4 days ago
Also, the nocebo effect is real.
shneancy@lemmy.world 4 days ago
deeply meaningless rant:
why do we need two words for placebo effect when it’s just positive placebo and negative placebo, i know i know, the word placebo has an ingrained positive aspect in its root… but it’s not like the english language ever gives a fuck about the roots of a word, it bastardises all words equally! why make an exception now?? why not just call it negative placebo!
Hupf@feddit.org 4 days ago
Placebo Blocker
blackbrook@mander.xyz 3 days ago
This cartoon shows the real reason why that is the gold standard.
marcos@lemmy.world 4 days ago
There’s probably a mirror somewhere, with a person behind thinking “Please, let those be from the control group and not our students!”
luciole@beehaw.org 3 days ago
We need to go deeper.