Statistical learning shapes pain perception and prediction independently of external cues.
Elife
; 122024 Jul 10.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-38985572
ABSTRACT
The placebo and nocebo effects highlight the importance of expectations in modulating pain perception, but in everyday life we don't need an external source of information to form expectations about pain. The brain can learn to predict pain in a more fundamental way, simply by experiencing ï¬uctuating, non-random streams of noxious inputs, and extracting their temporal regularities. This process is called statistical learning. Here, we address a key open question does statistical learning modulate pain perception? We asked 27 participants to both rate and predict pain intensity levels in sequences of ï¬uctuating heat pain. Using a computational approach, we show that probabilistic expectations and confidence were used to weigh pain perception and prediction. As such, this study goes beyond well-established conditioning paradigms associating non-pain cues with pain outcomes, and shows that statistical learning itself shapes pain experience. This finding opens a new path of research into the brain mechanisms of pain regulation, with relevance to chronic pain where it may be dysfunctional.
Key words
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Cues
/
Pain Perception
Limits:
Adult
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
Language:
En
Journal:
Elife
Year:
2024
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
United kingdom
Country of publication:
United kingdom