Trial reportConsciousness and cognition2011
Placebo acupuncture as a form of ritual touch healing: a neurophenomenological model.
Trial report in Consciousness and cognition, 2011. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 20 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
20 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 51 citations in OpenAlex.
- Acupuncture for treating fibromyalgia.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2013Pooled it
- The effectiveness of acupuncture research across components of the trauma spectrum response (tsr): a systematic review of reviews.Systematic reviews · 2012Pooled it
- Trial
- Placebo-induced somatic sensations: a multi-modal study of three different placebo interventions.PloS one · 2015Trial
- Tai chi mind-body exercise in patients with COPD: study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.Trials · 2014Trial
- Therapeutic mechanisms of acupuncture therapy for acute pain in the emergency department.Integrative medicine research · 2026Review
- Differential placebo effect of sham acupuncture for chronic pain: a network meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.BMC complementary medicine and therapies · 2025Article
- Therapeutic Sensations: A New Unifying Concept.Evidence-based complementary and alternative medicine : eCAM · 2020Review
- "Honorable Toward Your Whole Self": Experiences of the Body in Fatigued Breast Cancer Survivors.Frontiers in psychology · 2020Article
- Acupuncture using pattern-identification for the treatment of insomnia disorder: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.Integrative medicine research · 2019Review
- Differential Influence of Acupuncture Somatosensory and Cognitive/Affective Components on Functional Brain Connectivity and Pain Reduction During Low Back Pain State.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2019Article
- Acupuncture and Neural Mechanism in the Management of Low Back Pain-An Update.Medicines (Basel, Switzerland) · 2018Review
- Cellular Reorganization Plays a Vital Role in Acupuncture Analgesia.Medical acupuncture · 2018Review
- Phantom Acupuncture Induces Placebo Credibility and Vicarious Sensations: A Parallel fMRI Study of Low Back Pain Patients.Scientific reports · 2018Article
- How Placebo Needles Differ From Placebo Pills?Frontiers in psychiatry · 2018Review
- Nonspecific Feelings Expected and Experienced during or Immediately after Electroacupuncture: A Pilot Study in a Teaching Situation.Medicines (Basel, Switzerland) · 2017Article
- The Signaling Theory of Symptoms : An Evolutionary Explanation of the Placebo Effect.Evolutionary psychology : an international journal of evolutionary approaches to psychology and behavior · 2015Article
- Perceived outcomes of spiritual healing and explanations--a qualitative study on the perspectives of German healers and their clients.BMC complementary and alternative medicine · 2014Article
- Placebo and other psychological interactions in headache treatment.The journal of headache and pain · 2012Review
- Canadian Orofacial Pain Team workshop report on the global year against orofacial pain.Pain research & managementArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Evidence that placebo acupuncture is an effective treatment for chronic pain presents a puzzle: how do placebo needles appearing to patients to penetrate the body, but instead sitting on the skin's surface in the manner of a tactile stimulus, evoke a healing response? Previous accounts of ritual touch healing in which patients often described enhanced touch sensations (including warmth, tingling or flowing sensations) suggest an embodied healing mechanism. In this qualitative study, we asked a subset of patients in a singleblind randomized trial in irritable bowel syndrome to describe their treatment experiences while undergoing placebo treament. Analysis focused on patients' unprompted descriptions of any enhanced touch sensations (e.g., warmth, tingling) and any significance patients assigned to the sensations. We found in 5/6 cases, patients associated sensations including "warmth" and "tingling" with treatment efficacy. The conclusion offers a "neurophenomenological" account of the placebo effect by considering dynamic effects of attentional filtering on early sensory cortices, possibly underlying the phenomenology of placebo acupuncture.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.