[saalweachter]

You have to be very, very when discussing the placebo effect to distinguish between reporting differences and actual differences. That gets very complicated when you only have self-reporting of a subjective state to evaluate things on.

The classic study was on asthma treatments. Patients would subjectively report feeling better when on the placebo treatment, but the objective measurements of lung function showed no difference.

If people report being in less pain or less depressed when on a placebo treatment but attempt & complete suicide at the same rate... well, fuck.