Context Interventions: Social Modeling and Initial Treatment Experience

Conditions

• Pain
• Placebo Effect

Eligibility Criteria

Sex

ALL

Age

18 Years - 55 Years

Healthy Volunteers

Accepted

Interventions

• Observed Success — BEHAVIORAL
  The demonstrator in video gets a placebo treatment, "Levoderm" analgesic cream, which will be shown to be effective at relieving pain.
• Observed Failure — BEHAVIORAL
  The demonstrator in the video gets the same placebo treatment, but shows little to no effectiveness from the placebo for relieving pain.
• Experienced Success — BEHAVIORAL
  The participant will receive reduced stimulus intensities after the placebo cream treatment to reinforce the effectiveness of the cream.
• Experienced Failure — BEHAVIORAL
  The participant will not receive reduced stimulus intensities after the placebo treatment, so the cream is not reinforced as effective.

Study Details

In this experiment, the investigators study the brain pathways underlying several promising context interventions that enhance the strength of placebo effects. Specifically, the investigators examine the separate and joint effects of two of the most powerful context interventions: Social modeling-observing someone else being effectively treated-and prior treatment success or failure experiences. Participants will be randomized into 4 groups (Social modeling: observed success vs. observed failure and Conditioning: experienced success vs. experienced failure). The objectives are to investigate the placebo effect on pain relief and aversive image stimuli between and within-subjects. Each group will undergo a behavioral induction phase, fMRI placebo test phase, and an identical 3-month follow up fMRI placebo test phase. Follow-up assessment will provide some of the first evidence on predictors of the durability of placebo and context interventions.

Key Dates

Start date

Dec 1, 2026

Status verified

Jan 2026

Primary completion

Dec 1, 2027

Completion

Dec 1, 2028

Study Design

Enrollment

120 participants (estimated)

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Intervention model

FACTORIAL

Primary purpose

BASIC_SCIENCE

Arms

• Experimental: Observed Success - Experienced Success
  This participant group (N=30) will witness a successful placebo during the "observation phase" (i.e. the demonstrator will display reduced pain expressions after receiving the cream) and experience a successful placebo during the "experience phase" (i.e. the experimenter will reduce the intensity of the pain stimuli after applying the cream).
• Experimental: Observed Failure - Experienced Failure
  This participant group (N=30) will witness a failed placebo during the "observation phase" (i.e. the demonstrator will not display reduced pain expressions after receiving the cream) and experience a failed placebo during the "experience phase" (i.e. the experimenter will not reduce the intensity of the pain stimuli after applying the cream).
• Experimental: Observed Success - Experienced Failure
  This participant group (N=30) will witness a successful placebo during the "observation phase" (i.e. the demonstrator will not display reduced pain expressions after receiving the cream) and experience a failed placebo during the "experience phase" (i.e. the experimenter will not reduce the intensity of the pain stimuli after applying the cream).
• Experimental: Observed Failure - Experienced Success
  This participant group (N=30) will witness a successful placebo during the "observation phase" (i.e. the demonstrator will display reduced pain expressions after receiving the cream) and experience a successful placebo during the "experience phase" (i.e. the experimenter will reduce the intensity of the pain stimuli after applying the cream).

Primary Outcome Measure

Intervention effects on pain ratings [ Time Frame: Immediately after pain stimuli ]

Central Contacts

• Tor D Wager, PhD
  603-646-2196
  [email protected]

Locations (1)

Find similar trials in Hanover, NH

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