The Center for Pain Research and Behavioral Health

is under the direction of Michael E. Robinson, Ph.D. It is housed in the Dept. of Clinical and Health Psychology at the University of Florida. The center is dedicated to the investigation and understanding of the experience of pain in humans. The projects range from pain perception investigations to the emotional aspects of individuals who are experiencing chronic pain.

Dr. Robinson also serves as the Research Director of the Spine Center. Students working in the lab also conduct research in several clinical settings including the Facial Pain Center, the Spine Center, Anesthesia Pain Center, and Rheumatology. Listed below are some of the programs of research in our center.

Research Programs

• Gender/Sex differences in pain perception and chronic pain complaint
• Clinical/Experimental Pain Perception: The application of laboratory psychophysics to clinically relevant stimulation in understanding pain perception in chronic pain sufferers
• Coping Styles and chronic pain
• The relationship of emotional (negative affect) components of chronic pain
• Prediction of treatment outcome and compliance in chronic pain
• The investigation of effort level in strength testing of individuals with musculoskeletal injuries
• Electromyographic studies of low back pain
• Effects of long term opioid use for chronic pain
• Decision making in use of medications for pain control
• Functional Imaging of Pain and Related Phenomena
• Patient Centered Outcomes

Clinical Activities

We are an integrated clinical service in several pain or pain related clinics. These include the UF SpineCenter, the Facial Pain Center, and the Anesthesiology Pain Center. All of these sites are multidisciplinary in nature and serve as excellent training sites for our students, interns and post-docs.

Image Notes

The brain images you see on various pages are from a set of studies being conducted with Drs. Price, Verne, Perlstein, and Craggs. They are FMRI images from our NIH funded investigation of the brain activation associated with placebo analgesia.

Comments or Suggestions?

Please email me at painstudy@phhp.ufl.edu