You can catch the effect of “night” from family, friends – even social media. But what is it?

In 1998, shortly after arriving at work, a high school teacher in Tennessee reported “a fragrance similar to gasoline” and dizziness. Shortly afterwards, many students and employees began to report symptoms of chemical poisoning. About 38 people had such extreme symptoms that were stored in the hospital overnight.

However, investigators I didn’t find any evidence The school has been contaminated.

How could employees and students of this high school in the United States have such extreme reactions without exposure to a toxic agent?

The answer is a “nocebo effect”.

What is the nocebo effect?

Most people have heard about the placebo effect in which false treatment can improve someone’s health because they believe that it will assist.

The nocebo effect is the opposite. This happens when someone expects a negative result due to harmless treatment or situation, and this causes worse health.

Employees and students from Tennessee High School believed that they were exposed to a toxic gas leak and the expected symptoms. These negative expectations meant that they felt unwell, even though there was no gas leak.

How is it critical today?

When the doctor prescribes you a novel medicine, it must warn about possible side effects because he agrees with his conscious consent.

But knowledge of side effects can cause their expectation, and therefore lead you to the experience of more side effects.

A vast -scale review was found Almost 73% of people In the drug tests participating in the placebo and told about possible side effects, the side effects reported despite the lack of busy treatment-a lecebo effect.

Placebo and Nacebo effects can also affect the effectiveness of real medical procedures.

For example, In one studyParticipants who were to expect that powerful painkillers would give them a mighty pain in pain, reported about twice as much pain in comparison with those who received the same medicine without saying that they were painkillers. However, when the participants expected that the same painkillers would worsen their pain, they had no pain relief – as if they did not receive the medicine at all.

How do the effects of Nacebo develop?

We already know that just warning people about possible side effects can boost the likelihood. We also know about it Earlier experiences Thanks to the treatments, they shape what we expect and experience. If we have experienced pain during treatment in the past, this may cause us to expect and experience more pain when we receive this treatment again.

Now there may also be growing nighto evidence socially sent between peers. In other words, we can “catch” them from other people like a frigid, except for the transmission is simply by observing others.

Negative expectations can spread from person to person, as shown In one experiment. Observing someone experiencing greater pain in response to treatment meant that the observer felt more pain in response to the same treatment when his turn arrives, despite the fact that the treatment experienced the observer, it was false.

Social media strengthen it, carrying personal stories about misfortunes much further than once, regardless of accuracy.

For example, the tweet of singer Nicki Minaj in 2021 claimed that “vaccine vaccine” (probably a vaccine against outstanding) gave her cousin the swollen nucleus and made him “powerless”. It went to her millions of followers and generated over 100,000 likes. It was overthrown a few days later.

One study showed that negative stories about the side effects of Covid vaccine – especially from friends or social media – were associated with it stronger expectations having the same symptoms. In turn, these expectations provided for the actual side effects reported after vaccination.

Some Australian study It was found that this effect was strengthened among people who were already very worried about the side effects, felt restless or stressed, or sought primarily in social media (instead of mainstream sources) for health information.

The effects can be earnest

In the case of units, nocebo effects can lead to unnecessary suffering with real pain and discomfort. Unpleasant side effects can also contribute to people Without continuing treatment in accordance with the recipe or completely abandoning it.

At a broader level of public health, the nighto effect may make it challenging to assess the safety of novel technologies and public health intervention. For example, health concerns appeared around safety Electromagnetic fields made of wireless signals and 5G towersAllegedly causing a number of physical symptoms, such as headache and insomnia.

In the laboratory these symptoms They were assigned to the answers of the nighto instead of the properties of the technology itself.

When unjustified negative information, people suffer from real health effects, companies are before repelling, and a wider community can grow suspiciously in the field of technologies, which are generally considered unthreatening based on available evidence.

What can we do about it?

People can reduce the likelihood of no -based symptoms by looking for reliable information from reliable medical sources or reputable health organizations instead of relying on social media.

But even the way information about side effects is transmitted contributes to the nocebo effect. So health care employees can be able to assist Frames Discussions potential side effects in a more positive way and – in appropriate cases – emphasizing that most patients have no problems.

Negative expectations can physically hurt us, and thanks to social media they can spread widely. However, remaining up to date, remembering our own beliefs and insisting on thoughtful communication on the part of healthcare professionals and public health campaigns, we can maintain NECOBO control.