The study “The association between test anxiety, learning strategies, and open-label placebo effects on academic test performance” presents a secondary analysis of a randomized controlled trial. Elisa Frisaldi examined whether test anxiety and individual learning strategies moderate the effects of open-label placebos (OLPs) on academic performance. The results suggest that students with higher levels of test anxiety achieved better exam outcomes in the OLP group compared to the control group. Moreover, cognitive, metacognitive, and resource-related learning strategies appeared to interact with the placebo effect. The authors emphasize the need for further studies to confirm and extend these findings. Read the full publication

It was a great pleasure to have Susanne Becker and Lisa Garcia from Heinrich-Heine-University Düsseldorfin our group meeting today! There new data, planned studies, and a lot of time for discussions about shared interests and potential collaborations! More information on Susanne's research group can be found here.

In the picture from left to right: Katharina Schmidt, Ulrike Bingel, Susanne Becker, Lisa Garcia, Sigrid Elsenbruch, and Adriane Icenhour.

In a recently published exploratory analysis of our randomized controlled trial, Elif Caliskan and members of our team examined whether psychological and physiological factors predict objective improvements (spinal mobility) after OLP treatment combined with treatment-as-usual. The results indicate that patients with lower pain catastrophizing benefited most, showing increased spinal motion velocity, while those with higher catastrophizing did not. These findings highlight that OLPs may provide measurable benefits for specific patient subgroups, pointing toward the potential of personalized pain medicine. Further studies are needed to confirm these results and to better understand the role of psychological factors in chronic pain management. Read the full publication

A new perspective piece led by Helena Hartmann details the many ways in which we cna use feminist approaches in our own research. Feminism is about all forms of challenging social, economic and political power taken by a dominant group. Applying a feminist lens to scientific research can bring many advantages. The paper functions as an access point for (1) why researchers should incorporate feminist approaches in psychological science, (2) what feminist approaches could look like and (3) how researchers can start incorporating them into their own work. Find out more about the Feminist Wonder Lab and read the full article published in Collabra: Psychology.

After many rehearsals, yesterday some of our lab members participated in the on-site review for the third funding period of the Collaborative Research Center 1280. We represented project A11 which investigates the neural and behavioral mechanisms underlying the acquisition, extinction and reinstatement of pain-related fear in the context of somatic pain. The newly planned project for the third funding period will tackle learning and extinction in dynamic environments in healthy individuals and chronic pain patients. Now we have our fingers crossed until the DFG makes their final decision!

In the picture from left to right: Katja Wiech, Katarina Forkmann, Jialin Li, Lea Busch, Ulrike Bingel, & Katharina Schmidt

This online study (n = 532) led by Diana Müssgens assessed preferences and expectations concerning open-label placebo (OLP) dosage form, intake frequency, and pricing. Round white pills were rated as most appealing, convincing, and effective. OLP pills were expected to be most effective for improving mood and sleep. Finally, people would pay most for OLPs intended to treat chronic pain, mood, and sleep. Want to know more? Read the full article here.

Helena Hartmann won one of the ten Top Young Science Best Paper Awards from the medical faculty! Read the prize-winning paper "A systematic review and multivariate meta-analysis of the physical and mental health benefits of touch interventions" published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour with shared first author Julian Packheiser here.

The Bingellab was selected by the Junge Akademie as one of 24 best research environments in Germany in 2024 (out of over 270 applications)! Thanks to our postdocs Livia Asan and Ezgi Arikan for representing us in Berlin at the prize ceremony. Read the full shortlist here.

We aimed to identify shared and distinct mechanisms of placebo analgesia induced by suggestions alone versus suggestions combined with conditioning. We conducted a systematic meta-analysis of individual participant data from 16 within-participant placebo neuroimaging studies (n = 409).

Both techniques increased activity during pain in the dorsolateral prefrontal and inferior parietal cortices and decreased activation in the insula, putamen, and primary sensory areas. Adding conditioning enhanced engagement of regions associated with context representation and pain modulation (e.g., dorsolateral/dorsomedial prefrontal cortices) and decreases in nociceptive regions (e.g., primary sensory and insular areas). Conditioning also strengthened the association between analgesia and nociceptive activity, as reflected in the Neurologic Pain Signature. Combining conditioning with instructions yielded greater analgesia, mediated by increased ventromedial prefrontal and dorsal caudate activity, alongside decreased sensory-nociceptive and cerebellar activity.

These findings suggest the two strategies rely on partially distinct mechanisms, which could be combined to optimize placebo analgesia's clinical application. Read the full preprint on bioRxiv here.

Lab members surrounding Jialin Li published a new preprint on BioRxiv as part of the SFB 1280. Appetitive and aversive conditioning are both fundamental to adaptive behaviour, yet there remains limited understanding of how they differ on the behavioural and neural level. We investigated the two processes during acquisition and extinction using functional magnetic resonance imaging and behavioural measures. The results suggest that while appetitive and aversive learning share activation in regions involved in sensory processing (occipital lobe) and learning (vmPFC), aversive learning uniquely engages areas promoting rapid acquisition (mediodorsal thalamus and locus coeruleus) and cautious unlearning, in line with the notion of a ‘better-safe-than-sorry’ strategy. Read more about the work here.