When you find a paper, Google the name of the journal + “impact factor”, and you should find something. Some journals display their metrics with different scores due to complications with the IF system, so you’ll need to judge those accordingly but they should come up with the same search keywords. There should be a body of literature with higher scores, not just single papers too. Also, look up your authors and see if this is actually something they’re qualified for. This all shows the idea has been established and accepted as part of the mainstream conversation. This is the academic “sniff test.”
The problem with hypnosis isn’t the absence of evidence, it’s the lack of significant effects (efficacy), notably as a standalone treatment. Most sciences measure this with a variant of a p-value. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-value?wprov=sfla1 Note that interpretations of p-values are susceptible to placebo effects.
It’s also kind of important that the research is relatively newer because of some metascience trends have changed our understanding of things and we have different standards now.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor?wprov=sfla1 This is part of how the scientific conversation works, it’s not perfect but good for generalising and mostly reliable. Things that become mainstream parts of the conversation will get more citations, especially as funding will flow those ways, so a lot of the criticisms smooth over. I’m trying to explain how this all works because it’s complicated and valuable to know and very political. Just because someone published something doesn’t make it infallible. There’s really a range of grey because it is a conversation. Having a good journal backing you carries a lot of weight as they rest their reputation on you, multiplying your voice in a way. I like to picture it like a video game multiplier.
PubMed is a search engine for many journals. It’s not one journal.
When you write a paper, you’re not trying to prove something. You’re trying to attack your hypothesis from all angles and disprove it. You want to be wrong because what’s the fun in knowing everything.
I’m asking you to back yourself with a credible journal. You did not and jumped to anecdote. I’m open to having my mind changed but I want to see actual evidence. This next journal has an impact factor of 2. This is not a great score, especially for medicine. Hell, even Frontiers scores higher. Placebos do work and have utility, by the way, just as the Harvard article I linked said and I’ve repeated over and over. That’s not the issue.