Evaluating a sufferer's pain: the role of contextual and attributional variables

This study examined the effects of context related information and observers' attributional style on evaluations of pain severity, the pain sufferer, and treatment choice for shoulder pain patients. Ninety-six undergraduate participants read information containing the independent variable manipulations before viewing a videotape of one of two shoulder pain patients undergoing a physiotherapy assessment. Participants then rated their perceptions of the pain patient and completed a questionnaire assessing their attributional style (AS) for others' misfortunes. This study used both a 2 (coping: yes or no) X 2 (medical evidence: present or absent) X 2 (target patients) X 3 (pain level: high, moderate, and low) design with repeated measures on the last variable (with AS as a covariate) and a 2 (coping: yes or no) X 2 (medical evidence: present or absent) X 2 (target patients) mixed design (also with AS serving as a covariate). Significant main effects and an interaction emerged indicating that a contextual factor, the perception of the patient's coping, influenced judge's perceptions of the pain sufferer. In addition, observers were sensitive judges of levels of pain severity. However, contrary to expectation, there were no effects for AS or medical evidence. Thus, while judges can differentiate between differences in the amount of pain a patient is in, pain patients appear to be facing biasing factors which may result in differential evaluations and treatment choices.