Pain Research Group

Our research

Almost everyone has sometimes perceived short-lasting, intense, and acute pain. Millions of people all over the world are afflicted by more severe, long-lasting pain.

Our research investigates how different pain states influence our mental abilities and emotions. We have studied how more simple cognitive functions, for example psychomotor ability, and more complex cognitive functions, such as attention, abstraction and self-control, are affected in different pain states. The relationship between social stereotypes and more long-lasting, clinical pain is another issue that we have investigated, as well as the effect of short-lasting pain on social stereotypes. We have also investigated the relationship between clinical pain and logical reasoning abilities.

Previously, we have investigated how different dimensions of pain could affect anxiety and depression coexisting with clinical pain states. In ongoing projects, we examine how perception of short-lasting pain is influenced by abstract thinking, concrete thinking, and distraction. In the future, we plan to investigate how different mental strategies could influence the perception of different pain states.

Concluded as well as ongoing research is based on data from participants with induced, experimental pain and from clinical populations with different musculoskeletal pain states. Examples of the latter are benign low-back pain, arthrosis, and more general pain states such as fibromyalgia syndrome.