Torture may permanently damage your brain by rewiring its perception of pain, according to a new study. Researchers at Tel Aviv University in Israel have determined that prolonged exposure to pain and suffering can cause abnormalities in the cerebral processes whereby pain stimuli are regulated and organized. The findings may broaden our current understanding of how physical trauma affects the mind. 
 
 In current scholarship, pain experience is thought to be controlled by two neuronal processes: pain inhibition and pain excitation. Pain inhibition refers to the mechanism by which one pain is suppressed in response to another. Pain excitation is the degree to which repeated exposure to the same sensation increases the pain felt. The new study, which is published in the European Journal of Pain, sought to investigate whether these processes were altered in torture victims. 
 
 To find out, the researchers enrolled 104 Israeli combat veterans of the 1973 Yom Kippur War in an experiment. 60 participants had at some point been prisoners of war (POWs) and suffered burns, severe beating, electric shocks, and starvation. In a series of psychophysical tests, the researchers evaluated each subject’s response to variety of mild pain stimuli. According to lead author Ruth Defrin, the pain responses observed in the POWs differed significantly from those observed in the control group. 
 
 Torture is thought to cause abnormalities in pain inhibition as well as pain excitation. Photo Courtesy of Shutterstock 
 
 "The human body's pain system can either inhibit or excite pain. It's two sides of the same coin," she said in a press release. "Usually, when it does more of one, it does less of the other. But in Israeli ex-POWs, torture appears to have caused dysfunction in both directions. Our findings emphasize that tissue damage can have long-term systemic effects and needs to be treated immediately." 
 
 According to the researchers, the POWs’ pain responses indicated an increased pain excitation and a diminished pain inhibition. In other words, the soldiers’ pain intensified faster, and was less likely to subside once a separate pain sensation was introduced. Overall, the POWs exhibited much worse pain regulation than soldiers in the control group. 
 
 Given the observed physiological changes, the researchers theorize that many POWs harbor concomitant psychological abnormalities. After all, bodily harm is often accompanied by humiliation, oppression, and other types of verbal abuse. "We think psychological torture also affects the physiological pain system," Defrin told reporters. "We still have to fully analyze the data, but preliminary analysis suggests there is a connection." 
 
 Source: R. Defrin, K. Ginzburg, M. Mikulincer, Z. Solomon. The long-term impact of tissue injury on pain processing and modulation: A study on ex-prisoners of war who underwent torture. European Journal of Pain, 2013. 

 Torture in the 16th century, dramatized. (PHOTO: PUBLIC DOMAIN) 
 
 The European Journal of Pain, which must be a tough place to work, published a study today out of Israel that found people who have been subjected to torture have different responses to pain than people who haven't—forever. Carried out by a physical therapist, two professors of social work, and a psychologist, the study argues that torture victims require medical treatment for this long-term pain response soon after torture, and that without it the body could continue to damage itself for decades. It also found that non-physical torture—POWs said they were subjected to extreme isolation, deprivation, and mock executions—may have some role in the long-term alteration of physical pain response. 
 
 The study recommended a conception of torture that suggests a physical therapy response to the likelihood of long-term pain problems. 
 
 The study looked at a group of slightly more than 100 Israeli combat veterans of the country's 1973 war with Syria and Egypt. Two-thirds had been taken prisoner during the conflict and tortured, and the other third had not. In addition to responding to written questions, "all were put through a battery of psychophysical pain tests — applying a heating device to one arm, submerging the other arm in a hot water bath, and pressing a nylon fiber into a middle finger," according to a summary of the research. 
 
 In line with previous research, the torture survivors "exhibited generalized alterations in pain perception and modulation," meaning they felt more pain than most people when responding to the same kind of stimulus. Their bodies were also less able to "modulate" that pain's effects. The human body usually responds to pain dynamically, essentially distributing it. The ex-POWs bodies exhibited a worse ability to regulate physical pain than those of the soldiers who had not been taken prisoner. 
 
 The study could not determine whether the evidence recorded now, 40 years after the war, was the result of the original experience of torture exclusively, or if four decades of chronic pain afterwards also influenced the breakdown of the body's pain regulation mechanism. In either case, the study recommended a conception of torture that suggests a physical therapy response to the likelihood of long-term pain problems. 
 
 Outside medicine, the study offers additional data points to debates over what kinds of treatment do or do not constitute torture. Treatment shown to subsequently make someone feel pain more acutely than normal, for the rest of their lives, could conceivably represent one element of a standard.
– Torture doesn't just hurt you once, it keeps on hurting you forever, a new study in the European Journal of Pain suggests. Researchers examined 104 Israeli soldiers who fought in the 1973 war between Syria and Egypt, 60 of whom had been taken captive and tortured, gauging their reaction to mild pain stimuli like heating pads and pressing a nylon fiber into a finger. The POWs exhibited a significantly stronger response, Medical Daily reports. "The human body's pain system can either inhibit or excite pain," the lead author explained. "In Israeli ex-POWs, torture appears to have caused dysfunction in both directions." Another interesting finding: Even POWs who hadn't been physically tortured, but had been subjected to isolation, mock executions, and other harsh treatment, exhibited altered responses, Pacific Standard notes, which could change our very definition of what constitutes torture. It's unclear, however, whether the torture directly caused the change, or whether chronic pain over the intervening 40 years had played a role.