A model of the placebo response as a conditioned response (CR) is presented and predictions from this model are listed. Through association with active ingredients (UCS), neutral (CS) places, persons, procedures, and things can come to acquire the ability to reduce pain, anxiety, and depressive responses. One major counterintuitive prediction from the model is that therapists who routinely use active ingredients (UCS) or powerful drugs will get stronger placebo effects than those who routinely use "inert" ingredients (CS) or weak drugs. Developmentally, placebo responding appears to involve two successive conditioning stages, which may involve first the left and later the right hemisphere in right-handed subjects. The relationship between placebo responding and hypnotizability is discussed.

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This study examined whether trait empathy is related to hypnotic ability and absorption. Sixty-four graduate students and mental health professionals completed the Harvard Group Scale of Hypnotic Susceptibility, Form A; the Davis Interpersonal Reactivity Index; and the Tellegen Absorption Scale as measures of hypnotic ability, empathy, and absorption. Correlation analysis determined that statistically significant relationships exist between empathy and hypnotic ability (r = .41); empathy and absorption (r = .43); and absorption and hypnotic ability (r = .31). The results also indicate that empathy and absorption are both predictors of hypnotic ability, although absorption does not appear to contribute a statistically significant amount of the explained variance in hypnotizability that is independent of empathy. It may be that the conceptual ground shared by both empathy and absorption is what predicts hypnotic ability.

Certain measurable high-risk factors that predispose people to develop functionally based somatic disorders are identified. These risk factors compose a multidimensional model that encompasses variables involved in the predisposition, the precipitation, and the buffering of stress-related symptoms. These high-risk factors are (a) high or low hypnotic ability, (b) habitual catastrophizing cognitions and pessimistic belief systems, (c) autonomic lability or neuroticism, (d) multiple major life changes or multiple minor hassles over a short period of time, and (e) a deficit in support systems or coping skills or both."Sometimes it is more important to know what kind of patient has a disease than what kind of disease the patient has."-Sir William Osier (Straus, 1968, p. 3) This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.