tranquilo
Bluelighter
The excellent doco' on the workings of the brain, currently being shown on the ABC, last night included an interesting section on how drugs influence our emotions.
The research conducted showed four subjects all of whom were given an equal dose of "an amphetamine". However, two subjects were told they were taking the drug, the other two were (falsely) told they were receiving a placebo. The two who were expecting the effects had a good time, were walking about the room and talking codshit to the camera. The other two, who were not expecting to feel the effects of any substance, sat in their chairs and simply felt uncomfortable, irritable and unwell. They thought these feelings were of their own making and a result of the environment they had been placed in, not a result of any substance they had taken.
The conclusion drawn from this experiment were that the 'good times' created from substances are far more than a series of chemical reactions. Our own expectations (in the form of synaptic patterning etc) play a powerful role in guiding these reactions into a positive emotional state.
Perhaps we often under-estimate how influential 'set' (and 'setting') is to our experience of a substance.
The research conducted showed four subjects all of whom were given an equal dose of "an amphetamine". However, two subjects were told they were taking the drug, the other two were (falsely) told they were receiving a placebo. The two who were expecting the effects had a good time, were walking about the room and talking codshit to the camera. The other two, who were not expecting to feel the effects of any substance, sat in their chairs and simply felt uncomfortable, irritable and unwell. They thought these feelings were of their own making and a result of the environment they had been placed in, not a result of any substance they had taken.
The conclusion drawn from this experiment were that the 'good times' created from substances are far more than a series of chemical reactions. Our own expectations (in the form of synaptic patterning etc) play a powerful role in guiding these reactions into a positive emotional state.
Perhaps we often under-estimate how influential 'set' (and 'setting') is to our experience of a substance.
