ANTH106 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Nocebo, Steven Levitt, Orbitofrontal Cortex
2 Jun 2018
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Week 13 Lecture ANTH106:
First, a review: causation vs. correlation
• An alien comes to Earth and observes: on days when it rains, people wear
raincoats – do raincoats cause rain? → correlation, but no causation
• Cannabis and the gateway theory
• Sex and stress during public speaking
Back to cannabis and the gateway theory:
• Why is there no study that can distinguish between correlation and causation
when it comes to studying cannabis and the gateway theory
→ when can you perform random experiments on people? When individuals have
given consent and the experiment would not harm participants
→ what ethical considerations have to be taken into account before you can
experiment on people
• Harm from receiving drug being tested
• Harm from not receiving drug being tested
How drug trials work –
• Open trial → both the researcher and the patient know full details of treatment
o PROBLEMS = bias and placebo effect
• Blind, placebo-controlled trials
o A) Single-blind trial → researcher knows details of treatment but
patient does not (eliminate the placebo effect, individual can’t be
influenced)
o B) Double-blind trial → both patient and researcher are ‘blinded’,
neither know what the participant is getting – most accurate research
results: no bias, controls for placebo effect
• When can’t trials be blinded?
o Times where you can’t get the placebo because you have to give
people the existing best therapy
o Times where there is no known therapy/other treatments
▪ Clinical trials (surgeries) – they know whether they have an
implant or not, or getting surgery
▪ E.g. People know if they are exercising or not
▪ Controlling someone’s diet – you know you are eating a certain
type of food or not
▪ Surgery → case where ‘sham surgery’ for people who had back
problems, put the people under anesthesia, making an incision
and stitching it up (but not actually doing anything to the
vertebrae) – people who received the sham surgery, it worked
for them → risks, ethical issues
▪ Only way to get ethics approval of sham surgery:
• It won’t damage or hurt the participants
• You can reduce the number of people receiving actual
surgery
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Correlation, but no causation: cannabis and the gateway theory, sex and stress during public speaking. Back to cannabis and the gateway theory: why is there no study that can distinguish between correlation and causation when it comes to studying cannabis and the gateway theory. When individuals have given consent and the experiment would not harm participants. What ethical considerations have to be taken into account before you can experiment on people: harm from receiving drug being tested, harm from not receiving drug being tested. It won"t damage or hurt the participants: you can reduce the number of people receiving actual surgery. Placebo response as a meaning response: moeman and jonas argue that we should think of the placebo response as a. Steven levitt on wine and sensory perception : do more expensive wines taste better? , conclusion = fancy people with lots of training can tell cheap wine from expensive wine, but regular people cannot.
