nocebo

Meanings

1. A substance which a patient experiences as harmful due to a previous negative perception, but which is in fact pharmacologically (medicinally) inactive.

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin nocēbō (“I will harm”), the first-person singular future active indicative form of noceō (“to harm”), by analogy with placebo. The word was coined by Walter P. Kennedy in an article entitled “The Nocebo Reaction” (1961). (see quotation).