To what extent can one's mind promote direct changes to the body? Can one's beliefs about the body become a physical reality, without mediating effects from behaviors? Specifically, can medical symptoms and the course of a disease be directly affected by a person's mindset about the illness?There is a vast literature about placebo and nocebo effects, that promote physical changes by creating the expectation of a change through a primer (for example, a fake pill). Placebos, however, often imply deception, or at least ambiguity, to be effective. The concept of Illness Expectation describes the expectations, both implicit and explicit, that a person who has received a diagnosis makes about the course of the disease. It can be characterized by different degrees of rigidity, and it is argued here that these expectations can ultimately lead to changes in the disease progression. These changes may happen through behavior modifications, or through a non-behavioral pathway, which may deserve exploration efforts from the scientific literature.

中文翻译：

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疾病预期在医学疾病发展中的潜在作用。

人的思想可以在多大程度上促进身体的直接变化？在不调解行为影响的情况下，人们对身体的信仰能否成为现实？具体来说，医学症状和疾病进程会直接受人对疾病的观念影响吗？关于安慰剂和Nocebo效应的文献很多，它们通过引物引起对变化的期望来促进身体变化（例如，是假药）。然而，安慰剂通常暗示欺骗或至少含糊不清才有效。疾病期望的概念描述了接受诊断的人对疾病进程的期望，包括内隐的和外在的。它可以通过不同程度的刚性来表征，并据此论证，这些期望最终会导致疾病进展的变化。这些变化可能通过行为改变或通过非行为途径发生，这可能值得科学文献进行探索。