Résumé
Healthy children are often required to repeatedly undergo painful medical procedures (eg, immunizations). Although memory is often implicated in children's reactions to future pain, there is a dearth of research directly examining the relationship between the 2. The current study investigated the influence of children's memories for a novel pain stimulus on their subsequent pain experience. One hundred ten healthy children (60 boys) between the ages of 8 and 12 years completed a laboratory pain task and provided pain ratings. Two weeks later, children provided pain ratings based on their memories as well as their expectancies about future pain. One month following the initial laboratory visit, children again completed the pain task and provided pain ratings. Results showed that children's memory of pain intensity was a better predictor of subsequent pain reporting than their actual initial reporting of pain intensity, and mediated the relationship between initial and subsequent pain reporting. Children who had negatively estimated pain memories developed expectations of greater pain prior to a subsequent pain experience and showed greater increases in pain ratings over time than children who had accurate or positively estimated pain memories. These findings highlight the influence of pain memories on healthy children's expectations of future pain and subsequent pain experiences and extend predictive models of subsequent pain reporting.
| Langue d'origine | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (de-à) | 1563-1572 |
| Nombre de pages | 10 |
| Journal | Pain |
| Volume | 153 |
| Numéro de publication | 8 |
| DOI | |
| Statut de publication | Published - août 2012 |
Note bibliographique
Funding Information:The present study is based on a portion of the first author’s dissertation. At the time that this research was conducted, Noel was supported by a Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Scholarships Doctoral Award from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), a CIHR Team in Children’s Pain Fellowship, and an honorary Killam Predoctoral Scholarship. This research was supported by a Marion and Donald Routh Student Research Grant from the Society of Pediatric Psychology (Division 54, American Psychological Association), a Canadian Pain Society Trainee Research Award from the Canadian Pain Society, and a Category A Research Grant from the IWK Health Centre awarded to Noel. Funding for this research was also provided by an operating grant from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and infrastructure funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation awarded to Chambers. Noel is a trainee member of Pain in Child Health , a Strategic Training Initiative in Health Research of the CIHR. Chambers and McGrath are supported by Canada Research Chairs. Stewart was supported through a Killam Research Professorship from the Dalhousie University Faculty of Science at the time that this research was conducted. We would like to thank the many children and parents who participated in this research. We would also like to thank Dr. Jennifer Parker, Aimee Dort, Bryanne Harris and Laura Slauenwhite for their research assistance, as well as Dr. Christiane Hermann for her valuable insights into our study design and methodology.
ASJC Scopus Subject Areas
- Neurology
- Clinical Neurology
- Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine