Editorial
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Anesthesiol. Jul 27, 2015; 4(2): 13-16
Published online Jul 27, 2015. doi: 10.5313/wja.v4.i2.13
Translating the expression of pain in the face of uncertainty: The importance of human pain experiments for applied and clinical science
Eric Kruger, Jacob M Vigil
Eric Kruger, Jacob M Vigil, Department of Psychology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131-1161, United States
Author contributions: Each author contributed equally to the production of the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: Eric Kruger and Jacob M Vigil do not report any conflict of interest in the ideas associated with or the production of this manuscript.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Jacob M Vigil, PhD, Department of Psychology, University of New Mexico, MSC03 2220, Albuquerque, NM 87131-1161, United States. vigilJ@unm.edu
Telephone: +1-505-2770374
Received: January 28, 2015
Peer-review started: January 31, 2015
First decision: March 20, 2015
Revised: April 12, 2015
Accepted: May 5, 2015
Article in press: May 6, 2015
Published online: July 27, 2015
Processing time: 179 Days and 20.6 Hours
Abstract

This brief commentary attempts to provide a concise synthesis of social psychology experiments that inform an interpretation of clinical pain. From a social perspective the expression of pain is a complex phenomenon that is greater than the patient’s physiology. Numerous experiments show that pain is modulated by social and contextual factors. These experiments point to the role of the listener as a social agent that can modulate the patient’s expression. Within the clinical setting the patient’s pain experience can be understood as the uncertainty of physical damage and their expression as an attempt to reduce that uncertainty. How successfully this occurs is in part dependent on the empathetic reception of the provider. Chronic pain is a state that is challenging to effectively model in humans but may persist in patients due to an inability to receive effective empathetic reception at the critical time of need (at or near onset). Rather than focusing on pain’s alleviation future avenues of pain interventions may do well by turning attention to the most effective ways to impart a message that the patient will be “okay” in a genuinely empathetic manner.

Keywords: Pain; Social psychology; Uncertainty; Fear; Catastrophizing; Contextual modulation; Health; Medicine; Pain management

Core tip: The experience of pain has much to gain from a social psychology perspective where experiments modulate the patient’s context and affect their expression. Clinicians and providers should understand that listening sends powerful social cues back to the patient in terms of empathetic feedback. When this feedback is provided in a timely fashion (at or near the time of onset) and in combination with ruling out serious medical pathology a clinician can provide powerful signals that changes patient’s experience of pain.