New Definition of Pain

[drusso]

IASP News - International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP)

IASP members are at the forefront of pain news and discovery.

www.iasp-pain.org

Proposed New Definition of Pain:

An aversive sensory and emotional experience typically caused by, or resembling that caused by, actual or potential tissue injury.

Proposed Accompanying Notes Section:

• Pain is always a subjective experience that is influenced to varying degrees by biological, psychological, and social factors.
• Pain and nociception are different phenomena: the experience of pain cannot be reduced to activity in sensory pathways.
• Through their life experiences, individuals learn the concept of pain and its applications.
• A person’s report of an experience as pain should be accepted as such and respected.
• Although pain usually serves an adaptive role, it may have adverse effects on function and social and psychological well-being.
• Verbal description is only one of several behaviors to express pain; inability to communicate does not negate the possibility that a human or a non-human animal experiences pain.

Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French peine, from Latin poena (penalty, punishment), in turn from Greek poinē (payment, penalty, recompense).

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[lobelsteve]

Some data to suggest plants experience pain or nociception.

 

[Ducttape]

suggest:
"Although acute pain serves an adaptive role....."

consider adding:
"Chronic pain is a maladaptive response to potential pain generators" or something of the sort.

consider rewording:
"through their life experiences, individuals learn the concept of pain" to "pain perception is modulated and altered independently by each individual's unique life experiences"