Hypnosis: History, Measurement, the Hypnotizable Person

Excerpts from Carrier Foundation Letter # 85, by Frederick J. Evans, Ph.D and Helen M. Pettini, Ph.D, 1983 And Anne M. Bozzuto, R.N., BSN, MA

Over the years hypnosis has been practiced under various guises to treat symptoms of both physical and mental illnesses as well as increase levels of wellness. Because little was known about hypnosis and the way it could influence behavior, an aura of the supernatural became associated with it. Remnants of this archaic concept still persist in the mind of the public, and are perpetuated by amateur therapists who claim the power of effecting magical cures, using a few stereotyped induction techniques and formulae to "drive away" any symptom regardless of origin.

Because of the early association of hypnosis with sorcery and magic, and the lack of a known acceptable scientific basis, many people are reluctant to use this method. In fairly recent times the health profession in this country began to realize the possibilities of using hypnosis as a practical therapeutic tool. Gradually, health professionals also began to realize some of the misconceptions that underlay the earlier modes of hypnotherapy. In many cases the improvements attributed to hypnosis were only temporary and frequently the beneficial effects could be attributed to other factors. The need for careful selection and evaluation of patients for this type of therapy became more and more evident.

Experimental and clinical research into the principles of human behavior traditionally associated with hypnosis was undertaken. In the last decade an impressive number of scientific studies have been conducted probing the rationale and techniques of hypnotherapy and evaluating its long-term effectiveness. It has now become clear that the use of hypnosis is practical in well-selected cases. However, positive therapeutic results can be achieved only if there is adequate understanding of the psychological aspects of behavior as well as a knowledge of health and wellness. This is essential for the safe and effective practice of hypnosis. Various professional and academic bodies have begun to offer graduate courses specifically designed to train practicing physicians, nurses, residents, and even medical students in the modern application of hypnosis. Today the qualified practioner of hypnosis is a physician, nurse, dentist or psychologist who has a special interest in this technique and has invested considerable time and effort to obtain adequate training in the field.

Hypnosis is becoming widely accepted as an adjunctive treatment for a number of medical problems, pain control, habit disorders, and symptom reduction. Ongoing research into the nature of memory disorders, amnesias, pain control, and attentional deficits is being conducted using hypnosis.

Brief History

The modern history of hypnosis begins with Franz Anton Mesmer (1734-1815). Mesmer was a product of his time. Like others since, he tried to apply new discoveries in physics to mental health, in this case the principles of magnetism. In 1784, several experiments conducted by the Royal Commission, headed by Benjamin Franklin, led to the rejection of Mesmer's animal magnetism theory. The alleged therapeutic cures were dismissed in a footnote as due to "mere imagination".

Braid (1852) first introduced the term hypnosis from the Greek and Latin words "hypnos" (to sleep), "somnus" (sleep), and "ambulae" (walk). Charcot (1882) considered hypnosis a manifestation of hysteria, influencing the later development of disassociating theorizing by Janet and Prince. Freud was influenced by Charcot, and his observations of the hypnotic abreaction in his famous case with Breuer (1893) were most influential in his development of the concept of unconscious motivation. Bernheim (1886) saw hypnosis....... as a manifestation of suggestbility, a view carried forward by the first major research program in hypnosis conducted by Clark Hull at Yale (1933).

Measurement of Hypnosis

Hypnosis research has made important contributions to the problem of evaluating subjective experience, the limits of human performance, the cognitive psychology of memory and attention, the study of consciousness and unconscious and disassociative processes, and, of course, clinical applications.

These developments have been possible because of the recent availability of a number of standardized scales which have made it possible to measure hypnotic ability quite accurately. The scales are based mainly on objective behavioral ratings of responses to suggestions, graded in difficulty, which cover a gamut of suggested subjective experiences during hypnosis.

The use of such scales provides a timely antidote for the common clinical assumption that if an induction procedure is administered, the individual must be hypnotized. In fact, only about 30% of normal subjects (and hospitalized psychiatric patients) score in the high range of hypnotizability, while another 10-25% will have very limited capacity to experience hypnosis. Most individuals have the ability to experience relaxation, and respond to simple suggestions, although they may not be able to experience some of the more difficult phenomena such as age regression, negative hallucinations, or compulsive posthypnotic behavior.

The Highly Hypnotizable Person

One unique characteristic which is typically not found in unhypnotizable subjects who are asked to fake hypnosis to a blind observer, is trance logic, or the ability to tolerate logical incongruities. For example, if asked to forget the number 6, the hypnotized subject might smile benignly but will not show any affective concern when, on counting his fingers, he discovers he has an extra digit! (In contrast, low hypnotizable subjects instructed to fake hypnosis for experimental purposes will cleverly find that they do have only 10 fingers.) This characteristic willingness to tolerate logical incongruity is the hallmark of the hypnotized person.

Viewed in this context, it is not particularly troublesome for the hypnotized person to regress to seven years of age. At one level he knows reality exists, but at another level reality can be suspended in an effortless absorption in a fantasy world. Of course, one's recollection of experiences a 7-year-old will have been contaminated by the contextual aspects of memory. Therefore, the hypnotized subject's regression does not necessarily reproduce that which actually happened when he was a child. While the distorted and confabulated material may be important therapeutically, there is a disturbing tendency for hypnosis to be used in forensic applications based on the faulty permise of accurate recall. Hypnotized subjects can lie under hypnosis just as easily as they can in the "waking" state.

The hypnotizable person is not gullible, hysterical, weak-willed, passive, prone to placebo response, and uncontrollably subject to the will of the dominant hypnotist. The highly hypnotizable person does have the capacity to become totally absorbed in ongoing experiences. e.g., becoming lost in fantasy or empathetically identifying with the emotions of a character in a play or movie. This ability to become lost in thought is not just a form of absentmindedness nor a lapse of memory; highly hypnotizable subjects have superior memories. The hypnotizable person ...has characteristics that cluster together to define an individual difference dimension of the "control of consciousness" or cognitive flexibility.