Open-label placebos reduce test anxiety and improve self-management skills: A randomized-controlled trial.

Test anxiety is a condition in which people experience extreme distress and anxiety before and in test situations. It affects up to 40 percent of all students. Conventional treatment includes both medication and psychotherapy, but studies also demonstrated that placebos affect anxiety symptoms. Although in the traditional understanding placebos need to be administered in a concealed way, intriguing new studies report that open-label placebos can be effective. Since prescription of fake pills involves ethical problems, open-label placebos may provide important new treatment possibilities. Here we report results of a pilot study examining whether open-label placebos may reduce test anxiety and improve self-management skills. 58 students participated in a two-group randomized controlled trial. Two weeks before an exam at the university participants received open-label placebos or no pills (control group). Participant - provider relationship and amount of contact time was held similar for all groups. After two weeks we found that test anxiety and self-management abilities (skills and resources) of the open-label placebo group were more improved than in the control group. Thus, our results seems to indicate that open-label placebos may reduce test anxiety and enhance self-management skills in students.

What should we do about student use of cognitive enhancers? An analysis of current evidence.

This article reviews current data on the use of cognition enhancers as study aids in the student population. It identifies gaps and uncertainties in the knowledge required to make a balanced assessment of the need for some form of regulation. The review highlights the weak evidence on the prevalence of use of such drugs, especially outside the US, and the ambiguous evidence for their efficacy in a healthy population. Risks are well documented for the commonly used drugs, but poorly appreciated by users. These include not only the side-effects of the drugs themselves, but risks associated with on-line purchase, which offers no guarantees of authenticity and which for some drugs is illegal. The case for urgent action to regulate use is often linked to the belief that new and more effective drugs are likely to appear in the near future. The evidence for this is weak. However, drugs are not the only possible route to neuroenhancement and action is needed to collect more data on the impact of existing drugs, as well as new technologies, in order to guide society in making a proportionate response to the issue. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled 'Cognitive Enhancers'.

Effects of diurnal variation and caffeine consumption on Test of Variables of Attention (TOVA) performance in healthy young adults.

The Test of Variables of Attention (TOVA) is a continuous performance test (CPT) that assesses attention, impulsivity, and processing speed. CPTs are used in the assessment of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children, but more young adults are being assessed for ADHD as well. The TOVA norms are based on a standardization sample that was tested early in the day, and any TOVA administered after 1:00 p.m. will be flagged as potentially invalid. Whereas the testing time recommendations make sense for pediatric samples, it is unclear whether they are appropriate for young adults in college, who typically show significant phase delay in their diurnal rhythms. In addition, many college students consume large amounts of caffeine, and it is unclear how caffeine consumption affects TOVA performance. The current study examined the impact of time of day, self-reported diurnal preference, and caffeine consumption on TOVA performance in a double-blind, placebo-controlled experiment with healthy college students. There was evidence of diurnal variation on average response time and impulsivity but not on overall ADHD score, with participants tested in the afternoon responding faster but making more commission errors than did participants tested in the morning. Caffeine consumption led to significantly faster response times, but only for participants who typically consumed relatively little caffeine. We conclude that the TOVA can be administered to young adults outside the recommended time constraints without compromising the validity of test score interpretation but that the caffeine consumption of participants should be closely monitored.