People experience both the good and bad effects of a drug more intensely when they think it’s expensive, a new study shows.
Research published in Science demonstrates that the perceived cost of a drug can amplify the ‘nocebo effect’ which is the experience of side effects from a medication with no actual therapeutic effects.
German researchers at University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf applied a cream to the arms of their subjects and told them that one of the possible side effects was pain in the area.
The subjects that were given the ‘expensive’ cream not only reported higher pain levels, but scans of their brains showed greater activity in areas associated with the experience of pain.
