I like the distinction between “psychological effects of believing that you took a drug” and “reversion to the mean”.
Within the former, I think there is a continuum between “purely mental effects” (like maybe being more relaxed, because now you believe your problem is being addressed by professionals) and “doing different things” (such as you stop doing things that harm your health, because you do not want to sabotage the medical intervention). There is no clear line between these two, because in some sense, even relaxing is “doing something”, but maybe it makes sense to distinguish between unconscious reactions, and things like “now that I am taking the pills, I stopped smoking or eating chocolate, because I would feel like a complete idiot taking the medicine and doing the thing that made me need it in the first place”).
I like the distinction between “psychological effects of believing that you took a drug” and “reversion to the mean”.
Within the former, I think there is a continuum between “purely mental effects” (like maybe being more relaxed, because now you believe your problem is being addressed by professionals) and “doing different things” (such as you stop doing things that harm your health, because you do not want to sabotage the medical intervention). There is no clear line between these two, because in some sense, even relaxing is “doing something”, but maybe it makes sense to distinguish between unconscious reactions, and things like “now that I am taking the pills, I stopped smoking or eating chocolate, because I would feel like a complete idiot taking the medicine and doing the thing that made me need it in the first place”).