Date of Award

Spring 8-1-1994

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Physical Education

First Advisor

Christopher Ingersoll

Second Advisor

Kenneth Knight

Third Advisor

Jolynn Kuhlman

Abstract

Specific terms are often used to describe the pain athletes will experience during cold treatments. It is not clear whether providing athletes with such sensory information will decrease their perceived pain during treatments. The purpose of this study was to determine if subjects' perception of cold-induced pain could be influenced by the type of information provided before treatment, such as "pain will be excruciating" or "pain will be minimal. 11 Ninety Division I intercollegiate athletes were randomly assigned to one of five groups: traditional terms (cold, burning, aching, numbness); high level (freezing, crushing, pounding, heavy), medium level (cold, gnawing, pulsing, aching), or low level (cool, pinching, flickering, dull) terms from the McGill Pain Questionnaire (MPQ); or no terms at all (control). The four groups that received a set of terms were told that those terms described the sensations they would feel during cold immersion of the ankle. Pain was measured with the MPQ every 3 minutes during a 21-minute immersion (1°C) of the foot and ankle. Sensory, affective, evaluative, and miscellaneous pain measures were then derived from the MPQ. A MANOVA was used to determine if differences existed between the groups. There were no differences between the experimental groups. The control group experienced greater sensory and affective pain (p<.05) than any of the other groups, and greater evaluative pain (p<.05) than the groups receiving low level or traditional terms. I conclude that providing athletes with some type of sensory information to describe their cold-pain experience will decrease their perceived pain during cold immersion, although it does not seem to matter what terms are used.

Download

Share

COinS