Self-reported pain sensitivity: Lack of correlation with pain threshold and tolerance

Many recent studies and several reviews have highlighted the potential clinical applications of experimental pain testing (e.g., for predicting post-surgical pain, treatment responsiveness, etc.). However, the implementation of quantitative sensory testing of pain sensitivity on a broad scale is limited by requirements of time, equipment, and expertise, and their associated costs. One reasonable question is whether one can obtain, via self-report, a valid index of an individual's pain sensitivity and pain tolerance. We analyzed data from a large number of subjects (n = 505) who had undergone standardized thermal pain testing, and found that while higher self-reported pain sensitivity was associated with higher scores on a measure of anxiety, no relationship was observed between subjects' self-report of pain sensitivity and subjects' actual pain threshold or tolerance. These findings suggest that circumventing psychophysical pain testing by assessing individuals' self-reported pain sensitivity is unlikely to be a useful strategy.