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Using the Biopsychosocial Model of Threat and Challenge to Understand the Occurrence of Placebo Effects

Caplandies, Fawn C

Abstract Details

2015, Master of Arts, University of Toledo, Psychology - Experimental.
Placebo effects are the physiological or psychological reactions evoked from the administration of an inactive substance or procedure (Stewart-Williams, 2004). Recent research has demonstrated that a key causal mechanism behind placebo effects is an individual’s expectations. Although expectations have been found to generate placebo effects in many studies, researchers have revealed that changing expectations do not always lead to placebo effects. The goal of the present research was to examine the possibility that a prominent framework of the coping literature, the Biopsychosocial Model (BPS) of Threat and Challenge, could help account for placebo effects in performance situations. According to the BPS model, individuals experience more of a “challenge response” if they view themselves as having enough resources to handle the task, or a “threat response” if they do not. If a treatment expectation is conceptualized as an asset, akin to perception of greater resources, then integration of the placebo literature with the challenge threat model is useful. The present research examined how the wording of a placebo expectation (gain or loss-framed) about the difficulty of the performance task determined whether an individual experiences a challenge or threat response to the task. This was tested in the present study using a performance paradigm successfully employed in research on the BPS model. Inconsistent with the BPS Model, task engagement did not increase from baseline through the performance task. In addition, participant’s completion of the performance task did not lead to significant differences between conditions. Consistent with the BPS Model, participants provided with a placebo expectation demonstrated physiological indicators of challenge, whereas no expectation participants displayed physiological indicators of threat (p<.05). Implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.
Andrew Geers, PhD (Committee Chair)
Rose Jason, PhD (Committee Member)
Levine Jason, PhD (Committee Member)
108 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Caplandies, F. C. (2015). Using the Biopsychosocial Model of Threat and Challenge to Understand the Occurrence of Placebo Effects [Master's thesis, University of Toledo]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=toledo1449411406

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Caplandies, Fawn. Using the Biopsychosocial Model of Threat and Challenge to Understand the Occurrence of Placebo Effects. 2015. University of Toledo, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=toledo1449411406.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Caplandies, Fawn. "Using the Biopsychosocial Model of Threat and Challenge to Understand the Occurrence of Placebo Effects." Master's thesis, University of Toledo, 2015. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=toledo1449411406

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)