Goals for coping with pain mitigate time distortion.
The cold pressor test was used to investigate the effect of specific versus nonspecific time-oriented goals on perception of time by a person experiencing pain. Headache pain has been shown to attenuate the retrospective estimates of time passage. In the present study, laboratory-induced (cold pressor) pain produced results congruent with those of a previous clinical report on headache. In addition, results indicated that giving a specific time goal for coping with pain minimized the time distortion. Time estimations of subjects in pain with a specified goal were found to be significantly longer (and more accurate) than time estimations of subjects who were in pain but not given a time-specific goal.
Thorn
B E
BE
Department of Psychology, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa 35487-0348.
Hansell
P L
PL
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D005260:Female; D006040:Goals; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010146:Pain / Q000523:psychology*; D010147:Pain Measurement; D010469:Perceptual Distortion; D013998:Time Perception