The psychological processes in the article include pain perception, and how we as humans perceive pain, how we react to it, and how we adapt to it. The article explains the pain signaling process and how pain can be amplified. For example, when we get pricked by a needle, a signal from our finger ascends through the spinal cord to reach parts of the brain. From there, we perceive pain, then we form a pain experience. Pain perception can be resulting from several factors such as the frequency of pain input, how sensitive the CNS is, How the body reacts after brain perceives and tries to send information to the injured area. A pain experience is when we have the urge to put a band aid on our injury, or be scared to get pricked from a needle again. However, each pain experience differs from one culture to the other, moreover, one person to the other. The article is conducting a research paper about pain and pain perception in different ethnic groups.
When an athlete faces a physical injury whether that be in a competition or practice, a team of highly certified professionals, which typically includes a first responder, physio therapist, and in some cases even a doctor, rush to the aid of the injured athletes. Diligent care and therapy goes into recuperating the athlete so they can make a complete recovery and return to their sport. On the contrary, when an athlete faces an injury from within, its been taught that it is the “athletes problem” and that they need to “toughen up”. But mental health problems can be just as damaging to an athlete’s career and athletes are left to suffer in silence. It is well known that athletes undergo tremendous physical strain and stress, these concerns
In Diane Ackerman’s essay “Pain,” she ponders about the subjectivity in experiencing pain, how to define pain, and its role in human life. She begins by emphasizing that an individual’s ability to endure pain may depend more on culture and atmosphere than on the actual magnitude of the pain. Given that at times humans can forego pain for a spell because of their atmosphere, Ackerman elucidates the importance of surroundings in how one experiences pain by exemplifying her claim through a phenomenon in football players. Ackerman continues her discussion on the disparities in the reception of pain by asserting expectations delineate the painfulness of events. Strengthening her claim that tradition affects pain, Ackerman considers how cultures
Pain is not only defined as a sensation or a physical awareness, but also entails perception. Moreover, pain is an unpleasant and an uncomfortable emotion that is transferred to the brain by sensory neurons. There are various kinds of pain and how one perceives them is varied as well. Certain parts of the brain also play a key role in how one feels pain such as the parietal lobe, which is involved in interpreting pain while the hypothalamus is responsible for the response to pain one has. Although some believe pain is just a physical awareness and is in the body, pain is all in one’s mind because the perception of pain and the emotion that controls its intensity differs in individuals and when pain itself is administered to the body, the brain determines the emotions one attaches to each painful experience.
A psychological response to common sports injuries is anxiety. This can be felt during a match if the player thinks that they might get hurt and can cause injury. When returning form a sports injury the player may have anxiety of the injury reoccurring, or be worried about not being as good at the sport as they were before or less fit.
Pain not only involves the physical reaction to damaged tissue, but also involves an emotional and cognitive response by the person experiencing the pain (Backer, 1994). A person's prior experience will influence how pain is managed. Pain is a signal that something is not
To most people, pain is a nuisance, but to others pain controls their life. The feeling discomforts us in ways that can sometimes seem almost imaginable. These feelings can lead to many different side effects if not dealt with or diagnosed. These effects can include depression, anxiety, and incredible amount of stress. The truth about pain is that it is vital to our existence. Without the nervous system responding to pain, we would have no idea if we were touching a hot stove, being stuck by a porcupine’s needles, or something else that could leave a lasting effect upon our bodies without us even knowing anything about it.
Pain perception can be less than might be expected from the extent of a physical injury. This was proven by a scientist called Susana Bantick, Oxford University, and colleagues who carried out a study on the influence of attention distracting pain processing (Bantick et al, 2002). During the experiment, brain processing was measured by measuring brain activity using fMRI. Participants rated pain from 1-10 when noxious heat stimulus was applied to their hand in the scanner. She then followed the same process but gave them a task which required cognitive processing; reducing the amount of focused attention on pain. Bantick, therefore, showed attention distraction can reduce the amount of pain perceived by the individual, also pain processing to the brain was reduced. This provides vital evidence that pain perception does not just depend on the injury alone.
The physical aspect of pain can be healed over time, whereas the mental can’t. Mental pain require professional help in order to help cope, and in some cases mental injuries can last a lifetime. This type of pain is usually associated with emotional distress. Despite all this, pain is a survival skill that our ancestors devolved in response to the dangers they endured millions of years ago. This skill is called fight-or-flight
Athletes focus on two forms of rehabilitation when they cope with an injury. These are physical and psychological rehab. “Understand that the player will likely go through a range of emotions following the sports injury” (Stark). These emotions include anger, a sense of loss of identity, fear and anxiety, and depression & loss of confidence. “Sports injury recovery typically focuses on physical rehab, but it is important to include sports psychology skills and techniques to help an athlete recover faster and learn to use physical setbacks to become a
Some point throughout our lives, we have experienced temporary pain in order to reach a more rewarding future. This pain can come in numerous forms for each individual, some physical pain, others mental or emotional pain, and some being a combination of the various types of pain. Whichever form of temporary pain an individual has, it is an obligation to be successful. I would venture to say physical pain is my dominant type of temporary pain. Temporary physical pain is something I have struggled with endless times in my softball career, just so I could play another game; this was the pain I I subjected myself to in order to keep playing the game I love. I realized after I fractured my hip during a game, too much pain took a lasting toll on my body. After the numerous doctor visits, tests, and X-rays, the doctors prescribed medication
The overall emotional response to injury can vary widely between athletes. Sports injuries often result in an immediate imbalance and disruption to the lives of the injured athletes including loss of health and achievement of
Society also depicts the masculinity is defined by strength, and that women cant handle as much. A study conducted focused on the aspect of pain tolerance in comparison to men and women conforming to the norms, believing that men are stronger; two studies were performed. The first study tested pain tolerance strictly based on using a hypothetical pain stimulus; scientists wanted to prove that people know and encourage norms on pain tolerance. The second study was done to observe knowledge about pain, and tolerance behavior. It required actual stimulus to be taken place on the participants; they experienced electrical impulses at different intensities. Results showed that high identifying men were able to handle more pain than high identifying females’ some men endured the pain because they felt obligated (Pool, G.).
Pain is something that connects all of us. From birth to death we can identify with each other the idea and arguably the perception of it. We all know we experience it, but what is more important is how we all perceive it. It is known that there are people out there with a ‘high’ pain tolerance and there are also ones out there with a ‘low’ pain tolerance, but what is different between them? We also know that pain is an objective response to certain stimuli, there are neurons that sense and feel pain and there are nerve impulses that send these “painful” messages to the brain. What we don’t know is where the pain
The International Association for the Study of Pain defines pain as “an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage” (1979). Pain is actually the culprit behind warranting a visit to a physician office for many people (Besson, 1999). Notoriously unpleasant, pain could also pose a threat as both a psychological and economic burden (Phillips, 2006). Sometimes pain does happen without any damage of tissue or any likely diseased state. The reasons for such pain are poorly understood and the term used to describe such type of pain is “psychogenic pain”. Also, the loss of productivity and daily activity due to pain is also significant. Pain engulfs a trillion dollars of GDP for lost work time and disability payments (Melnikova, 2010). Untreated pain not only impacts a person suffering from pain but also impacts their whole family. A person’s quality of life is negatively impacted by pain and it diminishes their ability to concentrate, work, exercise, socialize, perform daily routines, and sleep. All of these negative impacts ultimately lead to much more severe behavioral effects such as depression, aggression, mood alterations, isolation, and loss of self-esteem, which pose a great threat to human society.