Changes

When the human brain expects something to occur, metabolic and chemical processes begin. For example, when one suffers a headache and decides to ingest aspirin, a conditioned chemical response transpires in the brain prior to the pills being taken. As this person has been ''conditioned'' to believe that aspirin will cure her headache, the simple anticipation of relief increases the metabolic process, thus increasing blood flow to the brain. In a study presented in the “Journal of Neuroscience,” it has been discovered that “drug effects are reduced if expectations are absent.” (Benedetti et al, 2005). Blind studies measured the neurobiological effects of a placebo as treatment. One conclusion drawn by the group of neurologists was, “The expected administration of a drug has a more powerful effect on brain metabolism than the unexpected administration.”<ref>Fabrizio Benedetti, et al., "Neurobiological Mechanisms of the Placebo Effect," ''The Journal of Neuroscience''9 (November 2005), 25-45. http://jneurosc.org/content/25/45/10390.full.</ref> The study was conducted using a pain stimulus and the subjects received either a pain medication or a placebo. Those who received the placebo reacted similarly to those who received an actual opioid. In sum, the test subject believed he was receiving a pain medication, thus his cerebellum acted as if he had.

The phenomena that have been discovered in neurobiological testing can occur only if the subject has been conditioned to have a certain response to a specific stimulus. This can be illustrated via the classic example of Pavlov’s Dogs. The scientists conditioned the dogs to respond to a stimulus (a bell) in the same way that headache sufferers have been conditioned to respond to an aspirin. When the dogs heard the bell they began to salivate as they were conditioned to expect food after the bell sounded. When one who has a headache envisions a bottle of aspirin (stimulus), she has unconsciously set in motion a series of neurological events that result in physical change--- this is the equivalent of salivation. Whether or not the food is presented, once conditioned the dogs will salivate at the sound of the bell. The same is true with the example of the headache sufferer; once the idea of relief enters into consciousness the brain involuntarily instigates metabolic and chemical reactions.