Thinking ourselves faster

Posted by Olly Robinson on 17 July 2008 | 1 Comments

Tags: mind-body medicine

The Independent recently reported:

A new Australian study suggests that the faster speed that athletes achieve when taking performance-enhancing drugs is all in the mind. The study compared athletes on growth hormones with those given a placebo. Those taking the dummy pills sprinted faster, jumped higher and were able to lift heavier weights than those taking the hormones. The results imply that if you think you will perform better, you really will. That's not news to many professional athletes who for years have used creative visualisation to boost performance. "If you visualise being stronger, running faster or winning, you are priming your nervous system to do just that," says Dr Aimee Kimball, the director of mental training in sports medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. "Studies have found that the method can enhance physical performance significantly, sometimes by 20 per cent or more."

This points to the fact that we should stop thinking of the placebo effect as an error variable in clinical trials, and see it for what it is. It demonstrates that the physical body responds to belief, both in healing and in performance. It suggests that we can all, at any time, heal ourselves by devising our own beliefs and thoughts of wellness and hope. We don't need to wait for a white sugar pill. The revisioned placebo could be the basis of an empowering model of health.