Section of Neurological Rehabilitation, Hans-Berger Department of Neurology, Jena University Hospital, Jena, Germany.
Institute of Psychology, Friedrich Schiller University of Jena, Jena, Germany.
Brain Behav. 2019 Sep;9(9):e01377. doi: 10.1002/brb3.1377. Epub 2019 Aug 1.
The wording used before and during painful medical procedures might significantly affect the painfulness and discomfort of the procedures. Two theories might account for these effects: the motivational priming theory (Lang, 1995, American Psychologist, 50, 372) and the theory of neural networks (Hebb, 1949, The organization of behavior. New York, NY: Wiley; Pulvermuller, 1999, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 22, 253; Pulvermüller and Fadiga, 2010, Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 11, 351).
Using fMRI, we investigated how negative, pain-related, and neutral words that preceded the application of noxious stimuli as priming stimuli affect the cortical processing and pain ratings of following noxious stimuli.
Here, we show that both theories are applicable: Stronger pain and stronger activation were observed in several brain areas in response to noxious stimuli preceded by both, negative and pain-related words, respectively, as compared to preceding neutral words, thus supporting motivational priming theory. Furthermore, pain ratings and activation in somatosensory cortices, primary motor cortex, premotor cortex, thalamus, putamen, and precuneus were even stronger for preceding pain-related than for negative words supporting the theory of neural networks.
Our results explain the influence of wording on pain perception and might have important consequences for clinical work.
在进行疼痛性医疗操作之前和期间使用的措辞可能会显著影响操作的疼痛和不适程度。有两种理论可以解释这些影响：动机启动理论（Lang，1995，《美国心理学家》，50，372）和神经网络理论（Hebb，1949，《行为组织》。纽约，NY：威利；Pulvermuller，1999，《行为与脑科学》，22，253；Pulvermuller 和 Fadiga，2010，《自然评论神经科学》，11，351）。
使用 fMRI，我们研究了在施加疼痛刺激之前作为启动刺激的负面、与疼痛相关和中性词如何影响随后的疼痛刺激的皮质处理和疼痛评分。
在这里，我们表明这两种理论都是适用的：与负面词和中性词相比，分别与疼痛相关和负面词相关的疼痛刺激之前的强疼痛和更强的激活在几个大脑区域中被观察到，从而支持动机启动理论。此外，与负面词相比，躯体感觉皮质、初级运动皮质、前运动皮质、丘脑、壳核和楔前叶中的疼痛评分和激活对于与疼痛相关的词更强，这支持了神经网络理论。
我们的结果解释了措辞对疼痛感知的影响，并且可能对临床工作有重要影响。
