by jawns on 7/2/17, 5:13 PM
The article doesn't make clear whether the study participants were given acetaminophen to relieve pain (e.g. a headache), or whether they were simply given the drug regardless of whether they were currently experiencing pain. So I looked up the pharmacological procedures in the study itself, which confirms that it's the latter case. The drug was administered regardless of whether the subjects were experiencing any pain for which acetaminophen would be an appropriate treatment.
I would think it's at least conceivable that the body reacts differently to acetaminophen when it's used to treat pain, versus when it's administered even if the subject is not in pain. And especially since most people take acetaminophen for some pain-relieving purpose, rather than for no purpose at all, I would think it's important to try to emulate those real-world conditions when designing studies like this (although clearly it's difficult to control for something as subjective as pain).
Side note: I absolute hate when articles about scientific studies don't even name the study so you can look it up. In this case, the study appears to be titled "From painkiller to empathy killer: acetaminophen (paracetamol) reduces empathy for pain" and the full text is available here:
https://academic.oup.com/scan/article/11/9/1345/2224135/From...
by vilhelm_s on 7/2/17, 6:06 PM
There was also this paper from 2013, about acetaminophen relieving "existential dread". The experiemental setup induced subconscious anxiety by making the subjects watch David Lynch's short film "Rabbits", then measured it's effect on strictness when recommending fines for hockey rioters.
The researchers concluded, "Despite the many questions that these findings raise, they do demonstrate that acetaminophen has more far-reaching psychological consequences than previously realized, and that a single pill can serve as an effective manipulation in the lab."
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130416085431.h...
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0956797612464786
by mtgx on 7/2/17, 5:32 PM
by propman on 7/2/17, 5:11 PM
Anecdotal but I believe this happened to me...I took maximum daily dosage for 2 years and most likely other factors resulted in this, but I wouldn't be surprised if this did too. I used to feel awful about people's problems, depressing stories used to make me want to do anything to help, seeing homeless on the street near a fast food place made me often buy them a meal, and I used to care so much about friends' problems but I 90% stopped caring. Honestly can't say it's a bad thing either, I finally am focusing more on myself but it is a huge change in my life.
by alkonaut on 7/2/17, 5:45 PM
I had never heard the name "Acetainophen", apparently it's the same as Paracetamol.
by eeZah7Ux on 7/2/17, 5:09 PM
"If your job ... depends on feeling empathy for others, you might want to reconsider reaching for the Tylenol"
I'm afraid many "competitive" jobs depend on the opposite.
by pmiller2 on 7/2/17, 5:18 PM
I wonder if other pain relievers do the same. Has there been any work with aspirin, ibuprofen, or prescription pain relievers along these lines?
by Havoc on 7/2/17, 11:40 PM
> About a quarter of all Americans take acetaminophen every week.
Wow. That seems rather high.
by dlwdlw on 7/3/17, 2:49 AM
Could this be broadened to say that those who have coping mechanisms for pain have less empathy for the pain of others? As an explanation why the well off seem to have less empathy for the less well off.
by atemerev on 7/2/17, 5:44 PM
I suspect that this result extends to most painkillers. It was demonstrated before that emotional pain and physical pain are partially regulated by the same mechanisms, so painkillers work for emotional pain too (though less effective than specialized drugs) -- which will prevent sharing emotional pain from some situations, which can be reinterpreted as diminished empathy.
by exabrial on 7/2/17, 5:14 PM
Wow, pretty crazy find. Seems like a decent sample size too. I hope someone tries to reproduce the results!
by cbanek on 7/2/17, 9:32 PM
I wonder if opiates (or other painkillers) have the same effect. Most of the opiate drugs, such as hydrocodone, are mixed up with acetaminophen anyway in pill form. For example, a norco 5/325 is 5 mg of hydrocodone and 325 mg of acetaminophen.
by dlbucci on 7/2/17, 6:15 PM
In regards to the second experiment, isn't that kind of an obvious result? You take a painkiller, so the white noise causes you less pain, so you think that other people in the study are in less pain, which makes you seem less empathetic?
by tbabb on 7/2/17, 5:23 PM
No mention of effect size. N=200 is pretty small. Smells a bit like BS. Anyone have the original paper?
by taway_1212 on 7/2/17, 5:27 PM
I imagine military should be very interested in this.
by mulligan on 7/2/17, 5:08 PM
Might explain baby boomer behavior
by triangleman on 7/2/17, 5:12 PM
Nice istock photo there.
by aiyodev on 7/2/17, 5:23 PM
May 12, 2016
by watertorock on 7/2/17, 5:20 PM
Acetaminophen
Hate the click bait headlines, totally degrading to a paper like Washington post that presumably wants to maintain respectability. But you won't believe what happens next!
by gaius on 7/2/17, 5:13 PM
by egwynn on 7/2/17, 5:40 PM
I’d be in favor of two changes to the HN title:
1. s/This popular painkiller/Acetaminophen/
2. (2016)
by floatingatoll on 7/2/17, 5:37 PM
Mods, this is a repost from (2016).