Placebo and Nocebo Effects - Suggested Lesson Plan or Science Fair Experiment

An article got me to be thinking....How can Teachers encourage (teach) students to learn about the Placebo Effect....How to design their own Science Fair Experiments, etc. How to evaluate what others think of the Placebo Effect and the Nocebo Effect. How to form their own opinions. If they find it useful, how can they make their own placebo-enhanced medical devices, e.g. "a super band-aid" or "a mommy's mega-kiss to sooth an ouch".

Start Materials....

School Teaching Aid - Just the placebo effect? - http://www.scienceinschool.org/print/2577

Science Fair Project -

http://www.fun-science-project-ideas.com/Science-Fair-topics-Placebo.html

http://www.ehow.com/info_8267628_science-projects-using-placebo-effect.html

Google Search String to find more of the same - (lesson-plan OR science-fair) (placebo OR nocebo)

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Tom sez - To get the topic exciting, ask the students to look at the Museum of Quackery - http://www.museumofquackery.com/. What can we learn from Quackery? Patients say they work, yet Science says no.

Also, what can doctors learn from Medical Hucksters, Faith Healers, etc.? - The great American medicine show: being an illustrated history of hucksters, healers, health evangelists, and heroes from Plymouth Rock to the present by David Armstrong, Elizabeth Metzger Armstrong