Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-hc48f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T06:30:33.934Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Therapeutic encounters and the elicitation of community care

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 April 2018

Leander Steinkopf  and
Mícheál de Barra
Leander Steinkopf
Affiliation:
Scholar of Andrea von Braun Stiftung Foundation, D-81679 Munich, Germany. lsteinko@gmail.comhttp://www.leandersteinkopf.com
Mícheál de Barra
Affiliation:
Centre for Culture and Evolution, Department of Life Sciences, Brunel University London, Uxbridge UB8 3PH, United Kingdom. mdebarra@gmail.com
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Singh's analysis of shamanism is regarded as a contribution to the evolutionary study of healing encounters and evolutionary medicine. Shamans must create convincing healing spectacles, while sick individuals must convincingly express symptoms and suffering to motivate community care. Both have a shared interest in convincing onlookers. This is not restricted to shamanic treatment, but is still true in modern medical care.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 41 , 2018 , e86
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Brüne, M. (2015) Textbook of evolutionary psychiatry and psychosomatic medicine: The origins of psychopathology, 2nd edition. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
De Barra, M. & Cownden, D. (2016) Medicine as message: Caregiving, illness deception, and the cultural evolution of harmful treatments. Open Science Framework Preprint. Available at: https://osf.io/mxyts/.Google Scholar
Fabrega, H. (1997) Evolution of sickness and healing. University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Faessler, M., Meissner, K., Schneider, A. & Linde, K. (2010) Frequency and circumstances of placebo use in clinical practice: A systematic review of empirical studies. BMC Medicine 8:15. doi:10.1186/1741-7015-8-15.Google Scholar
Finlay, B. L. & Syal, S. (2014) The pain of altruism. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 18(12):615–17. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2014.08.002.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
French, R. K. (2003) Medicine before science: The business of medicine from the Middle Ages to the Enlightenment. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gurven, M., Stieglitz, J., Hooper, P. L., Gomes, C. & Kaplan, H. (2012) From the womb to the tomb: The role of transfers in shaping the evolved human life history. Experimental Gerontology 47(10):807–13. doi:10.1016/j.exger.2012.05.006.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hagen, E. H., Watson, P. J. & Hammerstein, P. (2008) Gestures of despair and hope: A view on deliberate self-harm from economics and evolutionary biology. Biological Theory 3(2):123–38. doi:10.1162/biot.2008.3.2.123.Google Scholar
Howick, J., Bishop, F. L., Heneghan, C., Wolstenholme, J., Stevens, S., Hobbs, F. D. R. & Lewith, G. (2013) Placebo use in the United Kingdom: Results from a national survey of primary care practitioners. PLoS ONE 8(3):e58247. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0058247.Google Scholar
Kleinman, P. A. (1986) Culture and depression: Studies in the anthropology and cross-cultural psychiatry of affect and disorder, revised edition (comparative studies of health systems and medical care). University of California Press.Google Scholar
Meissner, K., Höfner, L., Fässler, M. & Linde, K. (2012) Widespread use of pure and impure placebo interventions by GPs in Germany. Family Practice 29(1):79–85. doi:10.1093/fampra/cmr045.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Moerman, D. E. (2002) Meaning, medicine and the “placebo effect.” Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Navarrete, C. D. & Fessler, D. M. T. (2006) Disease avoidance and ethnocentrism: The effects of disease vulnerability and disgust sensitivity on intergroup attitudes. Evolution and Human Behavior 27(4):270–82. doi:10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2005.12.001.Google Scholar
Nock, M. K. (2008) Actions speak louder than words: An elaborated theoretical model of the social functions of self-injury and other harmful behaviors. Applied and Preventive Psychology 12(4):159–68. doi:10.1016/j.appsy.2008.05.002.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Steinkopf, L. (2012) Enhancing drug compliance and the placebo effect by raising subjective expectations. Medical Hypotheses 79(5):698–700. doi:10.1016/j.mehy.2012.08.011.Google Scholar
Steinkopf, L. (2015) The signaling theory of symptoms: An evolutionary explanation of the placebo effect. Evolutionary Psychology 13(3):1474704915600559. doi:10.1177/1474704915600559.Google Scholar
Steinkopf, L. (2016) An evolutionary perspective on pain communication. Evolutionary Psychology 14(2):1474704916653964. doi:10.1177/1474704916653964.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steinkopf, L. (2017) The social situation of sickness: An evolutionary perspective on therapeutic encounters. Evolutionary Psychological Science 3(3):270–86. doi:10.1007/s40806-017-0086-8.Google Scholar
Tilley, L. (2015). Theory and practice in the bioarchaeology of care. Springer International.Google Scholar
Tiokhin, L. (2016) Do symptoms of illness serve signalling functions? (Hint: Yes). Quarterly Review of Biology 91(2):177–95.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Williams, A. C. de C. (2002) Facial expression of pain: An evolutionary account. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 25(4):439–55.Google Scholar