The Phenomenon of Pain - Essay Example

?Pain Task: Pain Introduction In the discipline of psychology, several approaches help in defining how pain comes into the lives of individuals and the expected ramifications such as permanent disability in some cases. These approaches include those dealing with cognition, behavior and humanity among others. However, behavioral approaches to pain have brought significant observations in the examining acute and chronic pain. Therefore, writing about pain and its relationship with behaviorism is necessitated by the urgency to trace how chronic pain affects a person. The consequences of the symptoms when viewed from the perspective of classical conditioning ensure that human beings are wholly protected from harmful stimuli. In classical conditioning, positive and negative reinforcements play a crucial role in manipulating human emotions and feelings. It also connects with the social learning theory that largely encompasses the use of cognitive concepts to establish social contexts through observation and in depth psychosocial analysis (Crombez et al, 2007). Observational learning is another part of social learning that assist in assessing the overall impact of chronic pain particularly through direct enforcement. Despite the success of behavioral approaches in using various concepts and theoretical models to find a lasting solution in lessening the effects of chronic pain, cases of disabilities and even death persist proving it hard for psychologists to control the growing menace. Background Behaviorism is a fundamental approach in the field of psychology that helps in understanding pain. Pain could be in two forms namely acute or chronic and they come with varied symptoms that include irritation and frustration among others. However, such pain is often felt in the body through either injuries or disease to a part of the body resulting to a sensation. Such sensation in turn causes a stimulation that gets enforced into the body system through classical conditioning (Flor et al, 2002). In classical conditioning, certain reinforcements safeguard the body from pain such as the possession of strong stimuli incase of danger. Main Body According to behaviorist psychologists, pain encompasses the damaging stimuli or the distasteful feeling that a person experiences to avert the same experiences in the future. However, behaviorism in psychology is an approach that inculcates the values of methodology, theory and philosophy to investigate the observable behavior of individuals. Behaviorists, therefore, assert that any form of pain can be subjected to scientific scrutiny and should not fall to hypothetical constructs that include beliefs and thoughts. It means a critical examination of the concept of behaviorism entails assessing pain from biological, cognitive and behavioral perspectives. In the same capacity, pain transcends various realms connected to personality differences and the social environment because of individuals’ uniqueness in perceiving emotions and feelings. This often elicits positive emotional response that links behaviorism with pain especially in cases where people display hurt through visible stimuli such as screaming and yelling. Behaviorism through social learning theory, therefore, maintains that learning is enforceable through observation of punishments or rewards. In behaviorists’ view, learning is not limited to behavioral processes rather there are other social contexts that entail cognitive and vicarious enforcement (Gatchel et al, 2007). Psychological factors are thus instrumental in influencing learning in the subject of social learning theory in terms of motivation and other forms of integrative approach. Learning through observation is equally critical in understanding the impacts of pain when it is either self-inflicted or inflicted by others. Consequently, this is often accompanied by varied responses that give different types of pains in the body and mind for the victim. On the same context, behaviorist maintain that human behavior can be interpreted without considering the mental events that include the learning history and other forms of reinforcement. These reinforcements maybe observable and external and they assist in reviewing the mental events occurring to the individual. Other psychologists call the phenomenon logical behaviorism and it often has a few dispositions that cause mental causation to the body toward responding to pain. Similarly, the response to pain is conditioned to the person who has sensitive stimuli that distinguishes both chronic and acute pain in preventing future vulnerability to injuries and other forms of harm. There are also environmental enforcers that are connected to unconditioned stimulus that enhances the association with other response biases linked to the philosophical aspects of behaviorism. Therefore, other learning models are critical in ensuring that new behaviors developed by people predisposed to pain do not affect the social learning in terms of boosting cognitive and perceptual abilities that improve the functional value of the person when finding the desired behavior (Hobro et al, 2004). Behaviorism equally has numerous applications especially in the field of criminology where it used to contain deviant behavior that is characterized by aggression in most criminals. This is influential because it results to the assessment of human behavior by having emphasis on the nature of reinforcement while offering explicit instructions. Development psychology, on other hand, emphasizes on other situational factors that possess numerous dimensions that operate like child processes. Such psychology spreads to the changing of social circumstances that either cause pain directly or indirectly while avoiding the cognitive abilities and the moral judgments found within individuals or groups. Pain has a wider history because it generates the stimuli that safeguards people from any other future dangers. It means pain falls into varying classifications such as the duration before such a feeling inflicts harmful conditions to the body. Pain duration, therefore, suggests that it is transitory and when it lasts longer it becomes a chronic pain. However, for a short duration it is acute and this type often lasts in a second, an hour or even a day unlike chronic that theorists maintain could go up to 3 or 6 months. Another type of pain is nociceptive and it is brought by stimulation in the peripheral nerve fibers. This after such pain has exceeded the destructive intensity caused by nociceptors. There is also neuropathic pain that is a result of an affected nerve system in the brain by a disease and it interferes with the body feelings in what psychologists call somatosensory system (Knottnerus et al, 2003). Alternatively, other theories exist that have defined pain over the years toward understanding how it affects individuals in the field of social learning theory and logical behaviorism. Historical theories, for instance, insist that the scientific breakthrough of neurons and their function in understanding pain resulted to a closer examination of body reaction to harmful feelings. The theories were advanced by most ancient Greeks who distinguished between acute and chronic pain including the succeeding disturbance it caused the body and the mind of the affected individual. Consequently, this led to the three dimensions of pain that entail the affective-motivational, sensory-discriminative and cognitive-evaluative. The types of pains mentioned above have a connection to a behavioral and evolutionary model whereby individuals respond differently to painful stimulus depending on the body part affected by the harmful situation. On that account, chronic pain remains the most integral part of study in behaviorism especially in understanding the duration pain takes in the body before any healing process is undertaken by a medic (Kuile et al, 1995). Other researchers and theorists describe chronic pain as a defensive mechanism that protects individuals from serious dangers particularly when the flight hormones are ineffective. Chronic pain is subdivided into neuropathic and nociceptive. Neuropathic pain encompasses the malfunction or damage that occurs to the nervous system while nociceptive is usually activated by nociceptors affects the bones, blood vessels, tendons and muscles. Similarly, in nociceptive pain, stimulation in the nociceptors causes a person to experience visceral pain that comes from the viscera or organs. The organs undergo a sensation that spreads to the spinal cord or brain that also affects the peripheral nervous system. There is also anxiety sensitivity (AS) that generates bodily sensations thus causing pain-related fear that initiates avoidance or escape in the person. According to psychologists and theories, elements of AS in the human body system aggravate the fear of pain especially when it is chronic. As a result, research studies have discovered the fear-avoidance model that examines the repercussions of chronic pain in people who suffer from cognitive-behavioral difficulties. This scenario is further complicated by the emotional reactions that accompany instances of threat such as a dangerous animal that eventually increases a defensive behavior and a sympathetic arousal. Chronic pain is heavily reduced by the defensive escape behaviors in terms of lessening the fear levels in patients with different values and beliefs (Linton et al, 2006). Pain severity and catastrophizing equally have a common link because both elicit the same responses and also form part of chronic pain. The tragedy suggests that functional disability caused by such forms of pain embody the same consequence in terms of the cognitive expectations and other formats of behavioral responses. Various behaviorist approaches to pain continues to create a huge impact in the industry for theorists and psychologists dealing with all types of pain. For instance, the cognitive behavioral approach to chronic pain is characterized by hard problems during treatment. Such cases demand for a mixture of physical and psychological therapies that give vital benefits to the suffering individual. It means certain psychosocial variables such as biological factors contribute immensely to acute and chronic pain while upping the anxiety and stress levels. Additionally, findings indicate that behavioral perspective on pain increases the depression scores among people suffering from chronic pain syndromes (Linton et al, 2006). Consequently, this heightens varying medical implications by creating a vicious cycle of symptoms and pathological consequences to the individual. Among the symptoms connected to behavioral understanding of chronic pain include soreness, stiffness and burning sensation that induces sleepless and fatigue. Medical care also forms part of comprehending how behavioral approaches are integral toward assessing how patients suffering from psychological and physical problems cope while trying to assimilate other available options of medication. It is the scenario mentioned above that ensures that cognitive behavioral approaches have an overall influence on hopelessness, irritability, anxiety and stress that causes people to withdraw from life events. Operant condition, on the other hand, has heavily manipulated chronic pain through its reinforcement of health controls that increases an individual’s skin conductance and heart rate. The operant model also initiates acute and chronic behavior symptoms that decrease the rate of pain in the body system. As a result, the conditioning ensures that only a few people survive with a long lasting pain characterized by frustration, depression, and irritation. Contrastingly, the behavioral approach in chronic sufferers often has devastating effects in terms of treatment that spread to the strategies of introducing conceptual shifts such as social and psychological variables. According to clinicians trained in studying pain, control theory is fundamental in protecting patients suffering from epilepsy caused by auditory and visual sensations during abrupt sensations (Taylor et al, 1996). This affirms the operant conditioning perspective advanced by Wilbert Fordyce who stressed that behavioral dysfunction was a direct cause of pain noted in symptoms such as antalgic postures and avoidance behavior. Findings on behaviorist approaches also have a connection to classical conditioning that inculcates a cognitive perspective. This is achieved through attention to pain while evaluating the physical activities that define both the psychological and social wellbeing of the person. Classical conditioning also initiates coping mechanisms through safety-seeking behaviors to interrupt pain signals through the body system. Consequently, this often generates other pain-associated distress and according to numerous studies conducted by psychologists, this causes lack of flexibility in having coping mechanisms. Conclusion It, therefore, is critical for behaviorists and other psychologists to continue conducting studies that attempt to understand how pain works in the body system. This step will help reduce chronic pain that lasts longer in the body and has devastating effects for the affected individual if not treated on time. Similarly, behavioral approaches demand for closer investigation on how different forms of conditioning influence both stimuli and response before it develops to serious causes burning sensations. Such scenarios evolve to severe problems that require psychologists to collude with medical professionals in assisting affected persons (Linton et al, 2006). On the other hand, the government could disburse funds that support organizations dealing with pain reduction and prevention while also training people on sound methods of responding to all types of pain. The above information informs us that pain has a direct correlation with the stimulus and it remains upon individuals to take the necessary precaution of avoiding such cases. References Crombez, G. et al (2007). The Psychology of Chronic Pain and Its Management. Physical Therapy Reviews, 12, pp. 179-188. Flor, H. et al (2002). The role of operant conditioning in chronic pain: An experimental investigation. Pain, 95 (2), pp. 111-118. Gatchel, Peng et al (2007). The Biopsychosocial Approach to Chronic Pain: Scientific Advances and Future Directs. Psychological Bulletin, 133 (4), pp. 581-624. Hobro, N. et al (2004). Using the self-regulatory model to cluster chronic pain patients: the first step towards identifying relevant treatments. Pain, 108, pp. 276-283. Knottnerus, J. et al. (2003). Disuse and de-conditioning in chronic low back pain: concepts and hypotheses on contributing mechanisms. Europe Journal of Pain, 7(1), pp. 9-21. Kuile, M. et al (1995). Cognitive coping and appraisal processes in the treatment of chronic headaches. Pain, 64, pp. 257-264. Linton, S. et al (2006). The Fear-Avoidance Model of Musculoskeletal Pain: Current State of Scienti?c Evidence. Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 30(1), pp. 77-94. Taylor, S. et al (1996). Role of anxiety sensitivity in pain-related fear and avoid. Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 19 (6), pp. 57-71. Read More