Placebo applications could be a positive addition next to regular treatment in the pediatric health care. Previous studies have mainly focused on placebo applications as a replacement of regular...Show morePlacebo applications could be a positive addition next to regular treatment in the pediatric health care. Previous studies have mainly focused on placebo applications as a replacement of regular treatment and focus on adults despite the promising results for using placebo effects in pediatric care. Pediatric health care professionals and parents’ knowledge and opinions about the use of placebo applications could be related to placebo use in pediatric healthcare. To examine differences in and associations between placebo knowledge and expected effectiveness of potential placebo applications between healthcare professions and parents, an online questionnaire was used in 150 pediatric health care professionals and 28 parents of children who have undergone a medical procedure or treatment in the past year. Professionals had more knowledge about placebo effects than parents (t(176 =3.146, p =.002), and a higher expected effectivity, (t(147)=3.59, p<.001) of placebo effects than parents. More knowledge about placebo effects was associated with higher expected effectivity in both groups, which did not significantly differ between the two groups (z=1.79, p=.073, r(127)=.18, p=.047 (professionals), r(18)=.57, p=.009 (parents). The current study showed that knowledge and opinions on placebo effects are lower in parents than healthcare professions but are related in both groups. Future research could examine whether educating pediatric healthcare professionals and parents on placebo effects in child healthcare leads to more favorable opinions about placebo applications in pediatric care, allowing a larger use of non-invasive optimization strategies within child healthcare.Show less
The aim of the present study was to explore how directional cues (arrows appearing next to the picture of food), the healthiness of the food items and the selfesteem of the participants influence...Show moreThe aim of the present study was to explore how directional cues (arrows appearing next to the picture of food), the healthiness of the food items and the selfesteem of the participants influence the choice of food items. In order to find out the role of these factors, we recruited participants through the crowdsourcing website Amazon Mechanical Turk. The participants completed a series of tasks: rating the desirability of food items, choosing between food items, and filling out questionnaires. The data were analyzed relying on Repeated Measures ANOVA and Pearson correlations, using SPSS, and on Bayesfactor analysis, using JASP. The most important positive finding is that there is an interaction effect between the factors of healthiness and cue, indicating that if the food is healthy then cues have a significant positive impact on choice. The degree of self-esteem and the healthiness of food (processed or unprocessed) are unrelated to food choice. The relevance of cues under certain conditions is a factor that health campaigns should take into consideration.Show less
