Meaning, Medicine and the ‘Placebo Effect’

Anyone turning pages of general health and anthroposophical journals will have come across Moerman’s name. The ‘meaning response’ was the concept that drew my attention to his work a while ago. Was this concept just a renaming process of the so-called ‘placebo effect’, I asked myself? After reading this book I knew better.

Daniel Moerman is Professor of Anthropology at the University of Michigan–Dearborn, USA. His research interests include medical anthropology and symbolic healing in medicine, particularly the effects on health of the knowledge and understanding of it that people have. This variety of interests sometimes places him in a difficult position within the medical world, as some pure reductionist scientists might meet him with an eye of suspicion. In this latest book, being a theme book in a series of ‘Cambridge Studies in Medical Anthropology’, Moerman takes the reader on a journey through the valleys and high peaks of research of the placebo effect.

This book is aimed at behavioural and medical scientists as well as anyone with a deeper interest in the human reaction to the meaning of medical treatment. As the concept of the placebo effect has confounded reductionist thinkers for many decades Moerman attempts to review and analyse the ‘meaning effect’ as he calls it in an articulated, straightforward style. Not only is the evidence of, for example, colour effect, time effect and doctor–patient relationship neatly presented; Moerman also guides the reader through a very complex body of literature and accurately explains the vast amount of research that has covered the topic so far. In three parts containing a total of 13 chapters Moerman details a description of the meaning response ( = physiological and psychological effects of meaning in the treatment of an illness during which process the patient experiences knowledge, symbol and meaning), talks about applications, objections and opportunities of the meaning response and explains the relationship between meaning and biology. The meaning response, in his view, follows from the interaction with the context in which healing occurs, while the patient’s attitude and understanding of medicine play a fundamental role in the healing process.

This lively book conceptualises the complex construct of the meaning response in medicine while taking advantage of current research and newly developed ideas. I dare say that for future research it will be beneficial to use the term meaning response rather than the confusing term placebo effect.