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Pain is a distressing experience in which psychological factors, including stress, fear, and depression, influence its perception. It is a subjective phenomenon and is experienced differently from person to person. Unfortunately, pain cannot be measured objectively; pain scales are the only measurement instruments available. The inability of some patients to communicate makes it difficult to assess pain.
In four studies involving a total of 114 healthy participants, investigators used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and machine-learning methods to identify a multiregional brain pattern (a neurological signature) that was activated by physical pain induced by heat applied to the forearm.
The pattern included regions of the thalamu…