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THE FAQ'S ON HYPNOSIS: Need to know more about Hypnosis? This FAQ
series was created by Todd Stark. It has a lot of information about
hypnosis and answers many questions. This should answer some more
of your questions. |
Your
Frequently Asked Questions
We are indebted to
Todd I. Stark, who has been instrumental in setting up these pages, and
for his permission to use them. As you probably have already noticed
there is a lot of information here. This server
also has information about:
trainings,
books and tapes
about your questions about hypnosis. If you really
want to practice hypnosis with other people, there is no substitute for
reading about it, and taking trainings in hypnosis.
Enjoy these pages!
Frequently Asked Questions regarding the scientific
study of hypnosis.
Written and maintained by Todd
I. Stark, (ToddStark@AOL.COM) . July, 1993.
With much appreciation to the
following people who helped by providing references or particularly useful
suggestions:
- Grant Fair, for his detailed
list of sources on various physiological correlates of hypnosis, and
the idea to include research on animal hypnosis;
- Topher Cooper, for the
idea of the eidetic imagery data, and his invaluable help with the
research of psi data;
- Jim Lippard, for suggestions
about the section on volition and the section on physiological correlates.
- Sidney Markowitz (sidney@apple.com) ,
for his recollection of the Erickson paper about lip reading and subtle
communication.
- Carol Augart Seger (seger@cognet.ucla.edu)
for her posting of various useful references on attention and learning.
- Richard E. Cytowic MD
(p00907@psilink.com) for his posting of an excerpt from his new book
on synesthesia, which I quoted in the memory chapter.
The
Effects of Suggestion: From the Supernatural to the Mundane.
Scientists have studied procedures
identifiable as hypnosis for 200 years. Most of the detailed investigation
took place between 1950 and 1980. This was before the current medical
research into the chemical links among the body systems took place.
Links between the nervous and immune systems have been of particular
interest recently, along with their significance in health and disease.
A large percentage of the earlier research into hypnosis went into demonstrating
that suggestion (traditionally an agent in the shadowy realm of the
psyche) could influence various autonomic body systems in an observable
manner. Today this result is considered unremarkable. However, before
the days of hypnosis and biofeedback research (and before the discovery
of neuropeptides, cytokines, and other mediators of autonomic functions),
this was considered an incredible, even supernatural claim.
The classic hypnosis research
also demonstrated that some or all people respond differently to suggestion
under different conditions. Relatively little work has gone into determining
the precise details of how each suggestion effect occurs, because so
much of the focus has been on determining that 'something happens.'
The situation is not too far from what we come across in modern anomaly
research. In both areas, we need to move forward to detail what is going
on in each case, rather than simply prove that something interesting
is happening.
Today, there is basic agreement
among most researchers that such a thing as hypersuggestibility does
occur in some sense. This means that under certain conditions, unusual
feats of attention control, psychosomatic regulation, perceptual distortion,
and cognitive dissociation can be consistently produced in some subjects,
whereas under other conditions the same subjects can seemingly not deliberately
produce those same behaviors. Opinions are split about exactly what
conditions cause hypersuggestibility; i.e., whether it is a unique biological
state or whether it is the result of responding to the social demands
and expectations of the situation. Also, there is controversy over the
relationship between hypersuggestibility and cognitive dissociation.
Another thing that most researchers today do agree on is that hypnosis
is not the only procedure whereby such hypersuggestibility (or dissociation)
may be produced.
Dissociation
and Suggestibility: A Meaningful Grouping of Traits?
The dissociation idea, originating
in psychoanalytic theory, and historically strongly linked to neuropathology,
has held its ground for many years though its limitations are now becoming
apparent. The term is used for such diverse conditions as unusual experiences
of personal identity sense, the appearance of automatisms, and the splitting
of apparent intentions in behavioral responding. These different senses
of dissociation require some future research to explain their relationship
and underlying mechanisms, as well as the crucial relationship between
dissocation and hypersuggestibility.
The original conception of
dissociation was as an anxiety defense strategy, a way of avoiding 'stress,'
while gratifying other psychological needs. Without the emphasis on
an anxiety defense, this idea persists today, as one standard medical
reference puts it :
"... A process
whereby specific mental contents (memories, ideas, feelings, perceptions)
are lost to conscious awareness and become unavailable to voluntary
recall..." (16th ed. Merck Manual)
This seemingly straightforward
view of dissocation as mental contents lost to conscious awareness,
and as an anxiety defense, is complicated however by the psychoanalytic
tradition that organic disease can result from harbored resentments,
disease which appears in a metaphorical form expressing the patient's
unconscious feelings in a symbolic physical way. This provides a link
between dissociation and psychosomatic effects. "Hysterical" or "conversion"
symptoms are of psychogenic origin, and mimic organic diseases (as opposed
to organic diseases being the result of psychological stresses).
Such conversion symptoms consist
of about 5% of the 'neuroses' or minor anxiety disorders treated by psychiatrists,
according to one 1980 study. Typical examples are unusual allergic reactions,
simulated pregnancy, pseudo 2nd-degree sunburns, hysterical blindness
or deafness, visual or auditory hallucinations, and other sensory or motor
aberrations. Conversion symptoms appear temporary, though they may 'move'
from one type or body system to another as each is addressed therapeutically.
Conversion symptoms and other
psychosomatic effects are associated with high hypnotizability scores
on standard scales, and also with a previous history of conversion and
dissociative symptoms, implying a stable trait-like quality. This quality
appears to have a genetic aspect and an early developmental trigger as
well. The correlation of psychoanalytic dissociation and hypnotic suggestibility
is further supported by the observation that hypnosis is frequently helpful
in alleviating conversion symptoms, yet often results in symptom substitution,
and that hypnosis is also frequently helpful in dissociative disorders
as well.
Two
"psychosomatic types," the Fantasy Prone and the Alexythymic
The seeming loose correlation
of psychosomatic symptoms, hypnotizability, and 'fantasy proneness' (in
the Barber and Wilson sense ) seems almost too neat a correlation to be
true, and it probably is too neat to be true. Common clinical observation
is that the typical psychosomatic patient, the alexythymic (term coined
by Nemiah and Sifneos), is unable to verbalize emotions or to sustain
elaborated mental representations. A number of psychoanalysts have noted
that psychosomatic patients engage in primarily 'operational thinking,'
are typically highly oriented toward the concrete, at least in therapy,
that they show marked poverty of imagination and symbolization.
This is the opposite of what
we would expect from the prototype "fantasy prone personality," (of Wilson
and Barber, for example) who might well be described as an imaginative
and even visionary individual. This seems to tell us that psychosomatic
effects are not as limited to a particular personality type as some theories
in the past had proposed. It also seems to further implicate internally-directed
emotional self-awareness as a factor in intentional control of psychosomatic
regulation, rather than in psychosomatic illness (or healing) itself.
This also makes sense in light of the various theories which propose that
the limbic system, in conjunction with the frontal cortical lobes, is
critical for intentional psychosomatic self-regulation.
Dissociation
versus Situational Factors.
Evidence has been mounting
steadily that different distinct 'states' of the nervous system can occur
in the same person at different times, and even in the same person at
the same time, illustrating the apparent biological capacity for dissociation..
The former is demonstrated in the rare condition of Multiple Personality
Disorder. The latter is demonstrated in the bizarre perceptual anomaly
of blindsight, where brain-damaged visually impaired individuals can be
demonstrated to have a kind of perception in their consciously blind visual
field. In addition to this evidence of cognitive dissociations, evidence
has also been mounting emphasizing the influence of personal and social
expectations on human behavior. Teasing apart what state factors are most
important and what situation-related expectations are most important in
any given situation is a crucial matter for future research.
The controversial case of the
'hidden observer' in hypnotic analgesia (apparently independent responses
from the same person at the same time under certain experimental conditions)
appears to be swaying the argument in favor of a dissociation view of
hypnosis in the case of exceptional subjects, but this debate is likely
not over yet. It seems likely that social psychological factors will need
to be considered as well in considering how suggestibility varies.
Hypnosis
as distinct from Suggestion
Evidence has been mounting
steadily that different distinct 'states' of the nervous system can occur
in the same person at different times, and even in the same person at
the same time, illustrating the apparent biological capacity for dissociation..
The former is demonstrated in the rare condition of Multiple Personality
Disorder. The latter is demonstrated in the bizarre perceptual anomaly
of blindsight, where brain-damaged visually impaired individuals can be
demonstrated to have a kind of perception in their consciously blind visual
field. In addition to this evidence of cognitive dissociations, evidence
has also been mounting emphasizing the influence of personal and social
expectations on human behavior. Teasing apart what state factors are most
important and what situation-related expectations are most important in
any given situation is a crucial matter for future research.
The controversial case of the
'hidden observer' in hypnotic analgesia (apparently independent responses
from the same person at the same time under certain experimental conditions)
appears to be swaying the argument in favor of a dissociation view of
hypnosis in the case of exceptional subjects, but this debate is likely
not over yet. It seems likely that social psychological factors will need
to be considered as well in considering how suggestibility varies.
Hypnosis
as distinct from Suggestion
Current theoretical frameworks
appear to be moving toward an even clearer distinction than we had in
the past between the hypnotic induction process and the resulting condition
of hypersuggestibility. Most classical hypnotic induction is indistinguishable
from other means of helping to induce a relaxed condition in the body.
Also, a number of experiments have demonstrated enhanced suggestibility
under conditions where the body is not relaxed (suggestion works outside
of hypnosis).
The common link between most
situations of hypersuggestibility appears to be a narrow selective focus
of attention. This is something which seems to result from such diverse
conditions as sensory isolation, relaxed attentiveness, and extreme fear.
There does not appear to be a single common general EEG pattern in hypersuggestibility,
or which makes hypnotized individuals distinguishable from awake ones,
though there are hints of possibly unique evoked potential responses during
periods of enhanced suggestibility.
One of the more intriguing
recent theories is that hypersuggestibility may somehow also be mediated
by the immune system and other chemiclly linked autonomic systems rather
than the brain alone. A two-way chemical feedback loop has been discovered
to operate between the nervous and immune systems, but it will take further
research to determine its relationship to suggestibility and psychosomatic
illness and healing in general.
What
is the neurobiological basis of suggestibility and of dissociation?
Traditional cortical inhibition
theories hold that hyper-suggestibility is the result of inhibition of
the cerebral cortex (and thus the usual 'critical faculties') due to some
sort of override by lower brain centers. This has proven to be an overly
simplistic way of looking at it. A more recent version of that former
Pavlovian theory is that the left cerebral hemisphere is somehow selectively
inhibited during conditions of hyper-suggestibility.
This is an expression of the
popular culture view of 'left-brained' and 'right-brained.' As for most
behavior, there will likely be evidence for a differential contribution
from the asymmetric cerebral hemispheres in hyper-suggestibility, but so
far differential hemisphere activity itself does not seem to be the primary
mechanism of enhanced suggestibility.
We have good reason at this
point to think of enhanced suggestibility as a common endpoint toward
which a number of methods can lead in some or all human beings. Hypnotic
induction is only one of these methods. There are also very good indications
that there is something special about some forms of dissociation that
merits further investigation into just what cognitive functions become
split, under what conditions these splits occur, and how they occur. It
is also of great interest how dissociation relates to various anomalous
phenomena (such as extrasensory perception, psycho-kinesis, and others)
that have long been associated with 'dissociative states.'
Contents:
1. What is hypnosis? How
did the various concepts of hypnosis evolve?
Hypnosis
arose out of an operator-assisted altered state induction model.
The
cultural origins of the concept of hypnosis
The
scientific deconstruction of hypnosis
2. What is hypnotic trance?
Does it provide unusual physical or mental capacities ?
"Trance"
descriptive or misleading?
Are
there potential clues in 'trance logic?'
So
what is trance logic?
Criticism
of trance logic.
Trance
as distinct from sleep or stupor.
"Trance
Reflex" and the appearance of stupor.
Evidence
of enhanced functioning following suggestion?
"Mind and Body"
in modern medicine.
Hypermnesia, perceptual distortions,
hallucinations, eidetic imagery.
Posthypnotic suggestion and
amnesia.
Pain control (analgesia
and anesthesia).
Dermatological responses.
Control of bleeding.
Cognition and learning.
Enhanced strength or dexterity.
Immune Response
Highly
extraordinary experiences while under hypnosis.
Bizarre remembrances under
hypnosis
Psychic phenomena under hypnosis
Experiences of extraordinary
personal significance
3.
How reliable are things remembered under hypnosis?
4. Can anyone be hypnotized
or only certain people? The search for the 'hypnotizability trait.
Hypnotizability
The
"Fantasy Prone Personality"
Can
hypnotizability be modified?
5. Can I be hypnotized against
my will, or forced to do things I wouldn't ordinarily do? Hypnosis, volition,
and mind control.
Is
the hypnotist in control of me?
Voluntary
vs. Involuntary
Conscious
vs. Unconscious
6. What should I read to
learn more ?
A selected bibliography on hypnosis and related topics
in science and philosophy of science.
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