Sex/gender differences in placebo analgesia and nocebo hyperalgesia: A pooled individual participant data analysis and living data resource

In 2025, the Placebo Imaging Consortium (PIC) joined forces with the Collaborative Research Center SFB/TRR 289 “Treatment Expectation” to create a meta-analytic dataset that investigates both participant and experimenter sex/gender effects in placebo analgesia and nocebo hyperalgesia. At the moment, we are focusing on behavioral effects, but also want to investigate neuroimaging measures later.

Project Leads

Helena Hartmann, Belkis Ezgi Arikan, and Ulrike Bingel

Involved PIC Members

Christian Büchel, MD, University Medical Center Hamburg–Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany

Jae Chan Choi, MD, PhD, Graduate School of Seoul Cyber University, Seoul, South Korea; Yonsei University, Wonju College of Medicine, Wonju, South Korea, Cham Psychology Brain Health Institute, Seoul, South Korea

Davide Duzzi, PhD, Università di Bologna, Italy

Falk Eippert, PhD, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany

Dan-Mikael Ellingsen, PhD, Department of Physics and Computation al Radiology, Division of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, Oslo University Hospital; School of Health Sciences, Kristiania University of Applied Sciences, Norway

Sigrid Elsenbruch, PhD, Department for Neurology and Center for Translational and Behavioral Neuroscience, University Hospital Essen; Department of Medical Psychology and Medical Sociology, Ruhr University Bochum, Germany

Sonya Freeman, PhD, Psychiatry Department, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, USA

Stephan Geuter, PhD, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, United States

Helena Hartmann, PhD, Clinical Neurosciences, Department for Neurology and Center for Translational and Behavioral Neuroscience, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany

Simon S. Kessner, MD, University Medical Center Hamburg–Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany

Jian Kong, MD, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States

Fausta Lui, MD, University of Modena e Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy

Marian van der Meulen, PhD, Faculty of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences, Université du Luxembourg, Luxembourg

Lieven A. Schenk, PhD, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany

Nina Theysohn, MD, Essen University Hospital, Essen, Germany

Zhaoxing Wei, PhD, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, United States

Nathalie Wrobel, PhD, Karolinska Institute, Solna, Sweden

Fadel Zeidan, PhD, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, United States

Additional authors from the CRC/TRR 289

Katharina Schmidt, PhD, Clinical Neurosciences, Department for Neurology and Center for Translational and Behavioral Neuroscience, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany

Livia Asan, PhD, Clinical Neurosciences, Department for Neurology and Center for Translational and Behavioral Neuroscience, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany

Michael Rose, PhD, Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany

Frederik Schlitt-Nguyen, PhD, Clinical Neurosciences, Department for Neurology and Center for Translational and Behavioral Neuroscience, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany

Dagmar Timmann-Braun, PhD, Clinical Neurosciences, Department for Neurology and Center for Translational and Behavioral Neuroscience, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany

Katja Wiech, PhD, Clinical Neurosciences, Department for Neurology and Center for Translational and Behavioral Neuroscience, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany

Christoph Wittkamp, PhD, Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany

Maren-Isabel Wolf, PhD, Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany

Other involved authors

Andrea S. Armbruster, Department of Psychology and Behavioural Science, School of Business and Social Sciences, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

Publications

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Preprints

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