PSYC 328 Chapter Notes - Chapter 10: Phantom Limb, Congenital Insensitivity To Pain, Ronald Melzack
Document Summary
Pain: an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage. Adaptive significance: pain is critical feedback and is needed for survival. Inability to experience pain (e. g. congenital analgesia) causes serious health problems. Medical significance: pain is a symptoms most likely to lead an individual to seek treatment. Psychological significance: depression and anxiety worsen the experience of pain, patient"s fear pain when undergoing treatments. A personal, subjective experience, influenced by cultural learning, the meaning of the situation, attention paid to the situation and other psychological variables. Soldiers reported on injuries in wwii: 25% of the soldiers and 80% of civilians requested morphine for comparable injuries, conclusion: experience of pain was very different depending on its meaning. To the soldier, pain meant he was alive and likely to go home. To the civilians, pain was an unwelcome intrusion.
