Dominance-submissiveness cues modulate pain threshold for mechanical pressure

Abstract

Acute pain sensation is an inherently negative but adaptive experience; however, research on pain sensitivity shows that simple contextual cues can effectively attenuate the pain. In this study, we sought to investigate how dominance cues, manipulated as vertical spatial (i.e., height) distance between participants and experimenter, affect participants’ pain sensitivity. Positioning participants in a spatially higher position relative to the experimenter was aimed to induce a feeling of dominance in participants. Conversely, a feeling of submissiveness was induced by placing the experimenter in a spatially higher position. In addition, we examined the role of dominance cues with respect to participants’ and experimenters’ gender. Two separate studies were conducted—Study 1 with a male experimenter measuring pain threshold in female and male participants (N = 137), and Study 2 with a female experimenter conducting pain measurement in a new sample of female and male participants (N = 122). The results of both studies demonstrated that participants in a dominant position reported a higher pain threshold relative to participants in a submissive position. Male participants had a higher pain threshold in both studies; however, Study 1 revealed a significant interaction of dominance manipulation and participant’s gender, with the effect of dominance cues being larger in men.