Try and see if you can find the real tablet on this screen.
If you guessed any of these, you're wrong, because these are all tic-tac's, but if I
was a medical professional handing over some tablets to cure your headache or the morning
after pill (you wouldn't want that to be a tic-tac), how do you know that it's the real
deal?
This is where the placebo effect takes place.
Could a doctor give you a pill which is actually a sugar pill (or tic-tac if you say it's supposed
to be minty) and cure their patient?
Science and research points to us being able to take a pill
In one study conducted around the placebo effect it was found that if doctors said that
the patient would "feel better in a few more days" that patients recovery was increased
than saying something like "this isn't going to help you at all."
Some studies have even shown that the amount you have to take, the size, how many you have
to take a day, what box the drug comes in and even the colour of the pill can make the
effect stronger or weaker.
Even things like getting an injection instead of taking a pill can have a stronger effect
even though they're all medically ineffective.
Some research suggests that the placebo effect works because the body releases endorphins,
not to be confused with dolphins.
Endorphins are the body's natural pain killers and could be why the placebo effect works
quite well when we're trying to get rid of pain.
One study found that those who were given a real drug which increased their hormone
level had the same amount of increase when they were given a placebo tablet later on.
The same study found that those who didn't get the initial hormonal increase drug didn't
see their hormone levels increase.
The placebo effect doesn't work for everyone, but it's interesting to think that perhaps
if we learnt more about it we could eventually cure ourselves with the power of our brains,
which would be much more useful than having to deal with the side-effects of the tablets
we take today.