Transcript Module 22: Hypnosis and Meditation

Hypnosis
Module 22
What is Consciousness?
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Consciousness – Your immediate awareness of thoughts,
sensations, memories, and the world around you.
William James – described consciousness as a "stream" or
"river" that is always changing but unified and unbroken.
Consciousness first studied through introspection (verbal
self-reports) and later rejected in favor of studying only
observable overt behavior.
1950's brought a new desire to study consciousness for two
reasons.
1. Complete understanding of behavior had to consider the role of
conscious mental processes.
2. Psychologists had created more objective ways to study
consciousness.
Hypnosis
• A social interaction in which one person (the
hypnotist) makes suggestions about perceptions,
feelings, thoughts, or behaviors, and another person
(the subject) follows those suggestions
• Hypnotist serves as a coach or tutor showing you
the way.
Hypnosis
• Works best with people who are open to suggestion or
value respect for authority
• State of awareness
• Highly focused attention
• Works better with children
• Vivid imagery/imagination
• Willingness to accept distortions of logic
• People do NOT lose control of their behavior. Instead,
they remain aware of where they are, who they are, and
what is transpiring.
• Alteration of sensation and perception
Hypnotic Induction
• The process by which a hypnotist creates a state of
hypnosis in a subject
• Usually done by voicing a series of suggestions
• Voice is usually calm and of a rhythmic tone
• People with positive views of hypnosis and open
to it are easier to hypnotize
Hypnotic Techniques:
Hypnotic Suggestions
Limits to Hypnotic Suggestions
• Suggestions usually involve sensations,
thoughts, emotions, and a wide variety
of behaviors.
• Hypnosis does not cause behaviors.
• Hypnosis can lead people to certain
behaviors but so can ordinary
suggestions.
Posthypnotic Suggestions
• A suggestion, made during a hypnosis
session, that the subject will carry out
when no longer hypnotized
• Technique can be used to encourage
helpful behavior changes, such as
stopping smoking or losing weight.
• Most only last for a few hours or days.
Hypnotizability
Is Hypnosis a Special State of
Consciousness?
Social Influence Theory
• Powerful social influences produce a state of hypnosis.
• Subject responds to social demands of the situation.
– Play the role of what is expected from a good hypnotic
subject.
• Argues that people will perform unusual acts simply because
an authoritative figure tells them to do so.
• Social factors/expectations influence people to believe
hypnosis will work.
Divided Consciousness Theory
• Promoted by Ernest Hilgard (1904-2001)
• People experience dissociation – the splitting of consciousness into
two or more simultaneous streams of mental activity.
• Neodissociation theory of hypnosis – a hypnotized person consciously
experiences one stream of mental activity that is responding to the
hypnotist’s suggestions.
– A second dissociated stream known as the hidden observer is processing info
that is unavailable to the consciousness of the hypnotized subject.
A woman doesn’t notice the smell of ammonia.
How can this be explained?
Evidence Supporting Hypnosis
• Role-Playing hypnotics drop the act when not observed
while actually hypnotized subjects maintain the act when
not observed.
• PET Scans reveal activity increased in the left and right
hemisphere color areas when they were told they were
seeing color. Activity decreased in the left and right
hemisphere color areas when they were told to see gray
rectangles regardless of what color they were. Only the
right hemisphere color areas were activated in people not
hypnotized. This shows hypnosis is a mental state.
• Imaginative suggestibility – the degree to which a person is
able to experience an imaginary state of affairs as if it were
real. Many people are open to suggestion even when not
under hypnosis.
Hypnosis and
Memory
Hypnosis and Memory
• There are isolated cases of hypnosis
helping recall.
• Cannot be sure if the memory came
back due to hypnosis
• Cannot be sure if the memory is
accurate or one that is created to please
the hypnotist
Hypnosis and Memory
• Posthypnotic Amnesia – person is unable to
recall specific info or events that occurred before or
during hypnosis. Produced by a hypnotic
suggestion.
– Effects are usually temporary and where off either
spontaneously with a posthypnotic signal.
• Hypermnesia – Enhancement of memory for past
events using hypnotic suggestion.
– Not proven to work and can lead to distortions and
inaccuracies or pseudomemories.
• Age Regression – Recall or reexperience an
earlier developmental period.
– Often distorted and not accurate.
Hypnosis
&
Pain Control
Pain and Hypnosis
• Dissociation
– Dissociate the sensation of pain from the
emotional suffering we define as painful (think of
“ice bath” study)
• Selective Attention
– Hypnosis doesn’t block sensory input but it may
block our attention to painful stimuli
Hypnosis & Pain Control
• If Time Allows:
• Play “Hypnotic Dissociation and Pain
Relief” (3:03) Segment #2 from The
Mind: Psychology Teaching Modules
(2nd edition).
• Watch this & read Time article on this
subject.
• Our cerebral cortex allows to filter out
certain info and focus on other info.
Other Hypnotic
Claims
Hypnosis helped me…
• Placebo Effect - Many claim hypnosis
can make a person quit smoking, etc…
• Improvement may be due to the power
of positive expectations
• People think they will get better so they
do
Feats of Strength
• Many feats of strength done under hypnosis
can be accomplished without hypnosis.
The "amazing"
hypnotized
"human plank"
Actually,
unhypnotized
people can
also perform
this feat.
Limits to Hypnosis
• You cannot be hypnotized against your will.
• Hypnosis cannot make you perform
behaviors that are contrary to your morals
and values.
• Hypnosis cannot make you stronger or give
you new talents.
MEDITATION
Meditation
• Aim to control or retrain attention. Two general
categories.
1. Concentration Techniques – focusing on a
visual image, your breathing, a word or
phrase. Often a mantra is repeated mentally.
2. Opening-up Techniques – Present-centered
awareness of the passing moment, without
mental judgment.
• Concentrate on the here and now without
distractive thoughts.
• Zazen or “just sitting” technique of Buddhism is a
form of this.
Effects of Meditation
• Transcendental Meditation (TM) – Concentrative
meditation that does not require any lifestyle
changes and follows a simple format.
– Sit with eyes closed and say a mantra or focus on
breathing over and over allowing distracting thoughts to fall
away.
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BENEFITS: lowering of psychological arousal by…
lowering heart rate
blood pressure
change to alpha-brain-waves similar to the state of
drowsiness that precedes stage 1 sleep.
• Learn more about the benefits of Meditation for ABC
News anchor Dan Harris (4 min)
SPECT scans show increased blood flow to both
frontal lobes and decreased blood flow to the
right parietal lobe during meditation. Frontal
lobes are involved in attention focusing tasks
and parietal lobes are involved in visual-spatial
tasks, which are not needed in mediation.