Price, Placebo, and the Brain

Journal of Marketing Research (JMR)

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Published 11/1/2005

Author: Gregory S. Berns

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Executive Summary
In this response to the lead article by Shiv, Carmon, and Ariely (2005), the author focuses on the neurobiological processes in the human brain that may underlie the placebo effect and its dependence on price. Biological correlates of the placebo effect have been demonstrated by finding decreased activity in regions of the brain called the “pain matrix.” These findings suggest that the placebo effect, at least for pain, is really experienced as decreased pain and not as a different cognitive process (e.g., decreased attention or memory). Shiv, Carmon, and Ariely extend this work by showing that price also modulates the placebo effect and that this modulation can occur without conscious awareness. In this commentary, the author suggests a possible biological mechanism that depends on the dopamine system to evaluate both the saliency and their expected value of environmental cues.

Biography
Gregory S. Berns is one of the only board-certified psychiatrists in the United States who also has a doctoral degree in biomedical engineering. He is Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences in the Emory University School of Medicine and Biomedical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He graduated (cum laude) in Physics from Princeton University; received a doctoral degree in Biomedical Engineering from the University of California, Davis; and earned his MD from the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Berns specializes in the use of brain imaging technologies to understand human motivation and decision-making, and his latest interest is in neuroeconomics. He has received numerous grants from the National Institutes of Health and has published more than 30 peer-reviewed original research articles in such journals as Science, Nature, and Neuron and is the author of Satisfaction (Henry Holt 2005).

J Marketing Research, Volume 42, Number 4, November 2005
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Journal of Marketing Research (JMR)