Personality traits contribute to 'placebo effect'
Thursday, April 23, 2009 - 15:56
in Psychology & Sociology
(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers at McGill University have found for the first time that novelty seeking personality types enjoy a stronger `placebo response,` or pain relief caused by the administration of a sham treatment, than people with reserved personalities. The study hypothesizes that the anticipation of pain relief, in this case triggered by the administration of a placebo, is a special case of reward anticipation. Since dopamine is a key neurotransmitter in reward processing, personality traits linked to dopamine, such as novelty seeking, were studied.