Looking back at a succesful
5th International Conference of the Society for Interdisciplinary Placebo Studies
past 15-18 June 2025 @ Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland
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As a SIPS member you will be part of the network. You will receive newsletters and you will be informed on opportunities to collaborate. As a member you will also receive a discount when registering for the SIPS conference which takes places every two years.
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We are SIPS.
The Society for Interdisciplinary Placebo Studies (SIPS) is an international association with the goal of understanding placebo and nocebo effects and their translation into healthcare and related fields.
Mission
Our mission is to facilitate dissemination of high-quality research and theoretical frameworks concerning placebo and nocebo effects, to promote interdisciplinary collaboration on placebo and nocebo effects and to increase stakeholder engagements (e.g. patient forums, general public) and to nurture career developments and to encourage diversity and inclusion in the field. Our goals are to foster research into mechanisms underlying placebo and nocebo effects and to support the development of ethically acceptable approaches and policies to harness the placebo effects and minimize nocebo effects.
Vision
We aim to accomplish these goals by developing a web-based contact list for members, maintaining a listserve that will provide an efficient means for sharing ideas or raising questions within our scholarly community, and promoting international conferences at which new research results and theoretical ideas can be presented. We also seek to promote empirical, conceptual, and ethical understanding of the placebo effect among academic researchers, healthcare professionals, and the public.
2025
5th International SIPS Conference
In June 2025, the 5th International Conference of the Society for Interdisciplinary Placebo Studies (SIPS) was held at the Auditorium Maximum of Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland. The event brought together approximately 200 participants from a wide range of disciplines—including neuroscience, psychology, medicine, physiotherapy, sports science, and ethics—underscoring the interdisciplinary spirit that lies at the heart of placebo research and the Society’s mission to foster meaningful cross-field collaboration.
The theme of this year’s conference, “From the Mechanisms of Placebo Effects to Treatment: Translating Basic Science into Clinical Practice,” set the tone for a scientifically rich and methodologically robust program. Over the course of the event, participants engaged with 4 keynote lectures, 12 plenary talks, 8 symposia featuring 24 presentations, 16 flash talks, 7 science slam presentations, and 109 posters, including 8 poster highlights. The scientific content explored both foundational and applied aspects of placebo and nocebo effects, with particular focus on how expectations, learning, and contextual factors shape treatment outcomes.
At the conclusion of the conference, the SIPS awards were announced. The Early Career Awards were presented to Stefanie Meeuwis (Tilburg University / Leiden University) and Aleksandrina Skvortsova (Leiden University), in recognition of their promising contributions to the field. The prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award was awarded to Professor Paul Enck (Tübingen University), honoring his decades-long impact on placebo research.
Taken together, the Kraków meeting marked an important milestone in the maturation of placebo studies as a scientific field.
Become a SIPS member
Join us and become a member of the Society for Interdisciplinary Placebo Studies (SIPS)