2. WHAT IS HYPNOSIS?
• A special psychological state with certain physiological
attributes, resembling sleep only superficially and
marked by a functioning of the individual at a level of
awareness other than the ordinary conscious state.
• This state is characterized by a degree of increased
receptiveness and responsiveness in which inner
experiential perceptions are given as much significance
as is generally given only to external reality.
3. THE HYPNOTIC STATE
• The hypnotized individual appears to notice only the
communications of the hypnotist and typically responds in an
uncritical, automatic fashion while ignoring all aspects of
the environment other than those pointed out by the hypnotist.
• In a hypnotic state an individual tends to see, feel, smell, and
otherwise perceive in accordance with the hypnotist’s
suggestions, even though these suggestions may be in apparent
contradiction to the actual stimuli present in the environment.
• The effects of hypnosis are not limited to sensory change; even the
subject’s memory and awareness of self may be altered
by suggestion, and the effects of the suggestions may be extended
(post hypnotically) into the subject’s subsequent waking activity.
4. HISTORY AND EARLY RESEARCH
• The history of hypnosis is as ancient as that of sorcery, magic, and
medicine; indeed, hypnosis has been used as a method in all three.
• Its scientific history began in the later part of the 18th century with Franz
Mesmer, a German physician who used hypnosis in the treatment of
patients in Vienna and Paris.
• Because of his mistaken belief that hypnotism made use of an occult force
(which he termed “animal magnetism”) that flowed through the hypnotist
into the subject, Mesmer was soon discredited; but Mesmer’s method—
named mesmerism after its creator—continued to interest medical
practitioners.
• A number of clinicians made use of it without fully understanding its
nature until the middle of the 19th century, when the English
physician James Braid studied the phenomenon and coined the
terms hypnotism and hypnosis, after the Greek god of sleep, Hypnos.
5. • In 1880s, Ambroise-Auguste Liébeault, an obscure French
country physician who used mesmeric techniques, drew the
support of Hippolyte Bernheim, a professor of medicine at
Strasbourg.
• Independently they had written that hypnosis involved no
physical forces and no physiological processes but was a
combination of psychologically mediated responses to
suggestions.
• During a visit to France at about the same time, Austrian
physician Sigmund Freud was impressed by
the therapeutic potential of hypnosis for neurotic disorders. On
his return to Vienna, he used hypnosis to help neurotics recall
disturbing events that they had apparently forgotten. As he
began to develop his system of psychoanalysis.
6. APPLICATIONS OF HYPNOSIS
• The most important consideration is that the person to be hypnotized be
willing and cooperative and that he or she trust in the hypnotist.
• Subjects are invited to relax in comfort and to fix their gaze on some object.
• The hypnotist continues to suggest, usually in a low, quiet voice, that the
subject’s relaxation will increase and that his or her eyes will grow tired.
• Soon the subject’s eyes do show signs of fatigue, and the hypnotist suggests
that they will close. The subject allows his eyes to close and then begins to
show signs of profound relaxation, such as limpness and deep breathing.
• He has entered the state of hypnotic trance. A person will be more responsive
to hypnosis when he believes that he can be hypnotized, that the hypnotist is
competent and trustworthy, and that the undertaking is safe, appropriate,
and consistent with the subject’s wishes.
7. • Hypnosis differ from one subject to another and from one trance to another, depending
upon the purposes to be served and the depth of the trance.
• Hypnosis is a phenomenon of degrees, ranging from light to profound trance states but
with no fixed constancy.
• however, all trance behavior is characterized by a simplicity, a directness, and a
literalness of understanding, action, and emotional response that are suggestive of
childhood.
• the hypnotist can induce a remarkably wide range of psychological, sensory, and motor
responses from persons who are deeply hypnotized.
• the subject can be induced to behave as if deaf, blind, paralyzed, hallucinated,
delusional, amnesic, or impervious to pain or to uncomfortable body postures, various
behavioral responses that has been suggested by the hypnotist.
• Post hypnotic amnesia
8.
9.
10.
11.
12. Compounding suggestions A compound suggestion is made up of two statements.
First, a statement that makes a suggestion, second, a statement of fact to cover up
the suggestion, a statement with which it would be really hard to disagree.
Progressive relaxation In this relaxation technique, you focus on slowly tensing and
then relaxing each muscle group. This can help you focus on the difference between
muscle tension and relaxation. You can become more aware of physical sensations.
Fractionation A form of hypnosis where the patient is made to enter and leave a
trance state many times in quick succession.
Conscious convincer A way to demonstrate how hypnosis or hypnotic phenomena
work. This is often used when someone is a bit skeptical or to show a new client how
easily they can go into hypnosis or a resourceful relaxation state.
Post hypnotic suggestions They are given to the Patient while they are in trance
and suggest that an outcome or new behavior will occur post- hypnotically after
trance is over. This is done so that the Patient receives benefit after the session
and/or between each therapy session.
Rapid inductions A suggestions for relaxation, focus, tiredness and metaphors such
as going down stairs, or floating on a cloud, etc., rapid inductions involve physically
'confusing', 'interrupting' or 'shocking' the subject.
Editor's Notes
deepening technique used within hypnosis is to to take people in and out of trance with rapid succession, known as fractionation.
encourages the hypnotic subject to think a thought that helps the process along, such as: “Wow, something is going on here.”