About the Authors

Irving Kirsch

To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: i.kirsch@hull.ac.uk

Affiliation Department of Psychology, University of Hull, Hull, United Kingdom

Brett J Deacon

Affiliation University of Wyoming, Laramie, Wyoming, United States of America

Tania B Huedo-Medina

Affiliation Center for Health, Intervention, and Prevention, University of Connecticut, Storrs, Connecticut, United States of America

Alan Scoboria

Affiliation Department of Psychology, University of Windsor, Windsor, Ontario, Canada

Thomas J Moore

Affiliation Institute for Safe Medication Practices, Huntingdon Valley, Pennsylvania, United States of America

Blair T Johnson

Affiliation Center for Health, Intervention, and Prevention, University of Connecticut, Storrs, Connecticut, United States of America

Competing Interests

IK has received consulting fees from Squibb and Pfizer. BJD, TBH, AS, TJM, and BTJ have no competing interests.

Author Contributions

IK abstracted baseline data from the FDA dataset, conceived the analyses, analyzed the data, and wrote the initial draft. BJD established correspondence between trials reported in the FDA dataset and those reported in the GlaxoSmithKline clinical trial register, abstracted the data from those trials, checked baseline data for trials in the FDA dataset, identified published versions of the FDA trials, and abstracted the data from those trials. TJM obtained the data from the FDA, and TJM and AS abstracted improvement data from that dataset. TBH and BTJ joined the project during the review process, analyzed the data, and assisted with subsequent drafts of the manuscript.