Cultural Models of Pain and Cognition

Millions of Americans suffer from chronic pain or other musculoskeletal pain disorders. For many, the etiology is not well understood, clear evidence of underlying tissue damage is not present, and the pain is highly contextual. Physical activity is an effective therapeutic tool for some forms of chronic pain, yet many sufferers feel movement is painful.

Emerging theory and evidence suggest that individuals learn to encode and interpret bodily sensations as pain signals linked to tissue damage; they attach meaning to the pain and related sensations. The investigator proposes to examine the relationship between the meaning given to pain and the physiological correlates of the meaning attributed to sensation among a group of individuals for whom pain and suffering are voluntarily induced.

The aim of the project is to use athletes to explore if, and how, meaning, pain, and movement are interrelated and to use those insights to generalize to non-athlete populations.

This study is designed to assess if the meaning humans attribute to their world influences their perceptions and performances in the world. To do so, the investigator will 1) interview 30 endurance athletes to generate an understanding of their cognitive models of pain and suffering, and then 2) use this understanding of cultural models of pain to develop an online survey that will be deployed to athletes and non-athletes to test whether endurance athlete’s understanding of bodily sensations differs from non-athletes.

Then 3) within a sample of endurance athletes, the investigator will further test whether athletes’ meaning attribution is associated with actual measures of physical performance. The study will allow a test of the theory that meaning attribution and pain are linked within athletes, which may then provide more general insights to pain treatment and therapies in a non-athlete population.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.