Overview

• The NIH team had 40 healthy volunteers rate their pain during painful heat stimulation while undergoing neuroimaging.
• External cues reduced pain reports for every participant and altered activity in a validated neural pain biomarker.
• Placebo-based treatment assurances lowered pain in roughly half of the participants and engaged evaluative brain regions.
• When predictive cues and placebo lotion were combined, the impact of external cues weakened, revealing interaction effects.
• The findings offer actionable insights for clinicians on how to frame procedural cues and treatment promises to improve pain management.