Benefits Of The Placebo Effect

The placebo effect and its benefits The placebo effect is a very interesting area of study also called the placebo response. In which a fake treatment, an inactive substance can sometimes improve a patient 's thinking simply because the person has the expectation that it will be helpful. What all placebos have in common is that they do not contain any active substance meant to affect health. A person given such an ineffectual treatment will often have a perceived or actual improvement in their condition. Researching I found the use of the placebo is older than its actual existence. In the past decade of the 20th century, most of the medicines prescribed by doctors were found to have no effect on the illnesses they were prescribed. Regardless, …show more content…
The leading experts in the field, including pharmacologists and psychiatrists are adding their voices to the movement. Placebo effects have been highly researched and a recent study demonstrated how the power of belief, an important component of the placebo effect, affects the areas of the brain that are considered to be activated during addictive behaviors. The reasons are quite simple. First, placebos are demonstrated through empirical evidence to have no real effects on the conditions that they are given for. This in turn can lead to do no harmful effects to the user than to offer more extreme treatment. Unfortunately, placebo controlled studies are not as prevalent in addiction dependence treatment as they are for psychiatric medication therapies. Does the addiction to drugs have a placebo component yes but it’s small. Addiction is clearly the pathology of the brain 's mesolimbic dopamine system, which probably is not influenced by a person 's expectations of becoming addicted. The treatment of an addict obviously involves some degree of placebo effect, whether the treatment is counseling, 12-Step therapy, or antic raving medications. Figuring out that mostly placebo treatments for addiction dependence from the more powerful and reliable therapies constitutes one of our biggest challenges. The healing power of the placebo allows addicts to get better completely naturally and independently then using other methods …show more content…
Initially, I thought that the idea of a placebo was clever and safer process than taking drugs and medication. Regardless, reading more into the placebo is interesting to think of it being based on the person unaware of the sugar pills or false surgery being done. It is scary to think that there is a chance that you may not get better might be because the proper medication was given and a doctor chose to prescribe a placebo instead. It is always interesting to see both sides of an issue in order to better understand the true effect that this process would have on patients. In the end, the placebo effect is an interesting psychological concept that has proven to be both effective and hazardous. Despite the disagreements related to specificity in psychotherapy, the results of clinical trials in psychotherapy and medicine indicate that the placebo is indeed powerful in situations where it would be expected to operate. It is clear that the beneficial aspects produced by medicine and psychotherapy involve factors that are not central to respective modal models or the received view of these endeavors. Research aimed at elucidating the placebo effect promises to produce valuable knowledge concerning the psychological and neurobiological dimensions of healing. The power of the mind continues to fascinate scientist and will continue for years to