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Boas-Malinowski t1_isc9hw9 wrote

Yes. Or diminish its efficacy. Or cause illness. It's called a nocebo effect. It's been known about for awhile, even if it wasn't called that. Walter Cannon in 1942 wrote a scientific article about VooDoo Death, explaining how belief in the curse can cause real physiological outcomes (like death).

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cupris_anax t1_ischfxd wrote

I remember reading about a case where an immigrant woman from africa went to the hospital somewhere in the US, with complaints about pain and partial paralysis "due to a curse". Doctors examined her and she was dismissed from the hospital after concluding that she was fine. She came back and this was repeated 3-4 times. First they thought she was trying some sort of insurance scam (i think she was homeless), but finally decided to call a "priest" with knowledge about her religion who performed something like an exorcism on her. She was fine after that.

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SeeMarkFly t1_iscqk5y wrote

Whatever you think has an effect.

Here is another example.

A 2014 study published in the Journal of Public Health found that people whose spouses had just died had a 66% increased chance of dying within the first three months following their spouse's death. 2 Prior studies had placed the increased chances of death for the surviving spouse even higher, at up to 90%.

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carrotstien t1_iscst9d wrote

wouldn't that be more easily attributed to stress related to a loss of a loved one..coupled with usually people lose spouses when they are both old

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Jimmy2Hertz t1_isf25e1 wrote

Seems pretty obvious that an elderly person with likely health issues and at risk of further ones would experience a fatal issue due to stress. People really underestimate how bad being stressed is for your entire physiology, suppressed immune system, hormonal imbalance, poor eating habits, blood pressure and heart rate fluctuations and many more things happen that can trigger serious issues in a short period of time.

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Significant_Sign t1_isd7hyk wrote

Aren't both nocebo & placebo seen really just in the area of pain management? Nocebo can't make you get cancer or whatever.

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