What's in a label?

Why finally getting a health diagnosis can bring relief – but a so uncertainty.

- BY MARC WILSON

I realise I haven't told you about the recent New Zealand Psychological Society annual conference in Hamilton. Other than getting snowed on as we returned via the Desert Road.

As well as the usual presentations and workshops, it was also a place for academics and practitioners to talk about the revision of our code of ethics, a discussion about scopes of practice, and the vexing topic of psychology assistants.

The keynote speeches took place in the University of Waikato's stunning new events space, The Pā. One of the speakers was Keith Petrie, professor of health psychology at the University of Auckland, whose work I've written about before.

He took the audience through what we know about the placebo effect - a positive health response to an inactive substance - and its "lesser-known sibling" the nocebo effect: when we experience a negative outcome in the absence of a valid cause.