Placebo pills are often used during medical research. The reason being is to determine if a medication actually works and to see if improvement was higher in people that didn't take the placebo. The most common question is how this placebo effect works. It's not an illusion but it's the brains response. Until recently there was no study to show whether or not the placebo still worked if the patient knew that it was. Interestingly enough, people seemed to do much better KNOWING that they were taking a placebo. "During a placebo response to pain, the brain releases pain-relieving chemicals…