In recent decades, the influence of positive and negative emotions on the experience of pain has been researched in many experimental studies.

Based on decades of clinical-psychosomatic and psychotherapeutic experience, the aim of our research group is to operationalise and test the influence of suppressed and unconscious emotions on psychological constructs in the form of experimental designs. The main focus is on researching the modulation of pain perception by suppressed or unconscious emotions using laboratory experimental studies. A modified paradigm is used and pain perception is recorded in a differentiated manner using self-assessment scales (pain intensity [NRSI], pain unpleasantness [NRSU]) and/or the measurement of peripheral physiological signals, EEG or imaging procedures.

Dr Stephan Frisch, PD Dr Steffen Walter, Prof Dr Harald Gündel

Doctoral students Vanessa Rebhann, Majd Ismail, Jos Langer

Richard D. Lane, MD, PhD: The University of Arizona, Health Sciences, College of Medicine Tucson, Arizona, USA

Ryan Smith, PhD: Laureate Institute for Brain Research, Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA

Prof Dr Karl-Jürgen Bär
Director of the Clinics for Psychosomatics and Psychotherapy and Geriatric Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at Jena University Hospital