People seemed to have two different selvesan experiencing self who endures every moment equally and a remembering self who gives almost all the weight of judgment afterward to two single points in time, the worst moment and the last one. The remembering self seems to stick to the Peak-End rule even when the ending is an anomaly. Just a few minutes without pain at the end of their medical procedure dramatically reduced patients overall pain ratings even after theyd experienced more than half an hour of high level of pain. That wasnt so terrible, theyd reported afterward. A bad ending skewed the pain scores upward just as dramatically.
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About Atul Gawande
Atul Gawande was a contemporary American surgeon. Atul Atmaram Gawande is an American surgeon, writer, and public health researcher. He practices general and endocrine surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. Read more on Wikipedia →
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- Life — Reflections on the meaning, challenges, and beauty of life