Reference no: EM131114168

Merritt's mother relates her concern about the psychological and physical effects that the steroids were having on her daughter. As a clinical psychologist, she was familiar with Robert Ader's work with white mice suffering from lupus. Ader had used classical conditioning to teach the mice to suppress their overactive immune systems. After he associated sweetened water with the drug that causes immune suppression, the inert substance alone triggered the conditioned immune response. As a result, the mice survived longer.

Might the same strategy help humans suffering from lupus? Merritt had to learn to associate a strong taste or smell with the steroid drug that slowed down her runaway immune system. The conditioning worked. Soon, just the taste or smell of the steroid enabled her to reduce her drug dosage.

Merritt's mother reports that her daughter died in 1995 of a heart attack. However, the conditioning very likely lengthened her life by ten years.

One of the side effects that Merritt suffered from use of the steroid drug was:

A.hair loss.
B.temporary blindness.
C.weight loss.
D.memory loss.