The International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis
Volume 46, Number 4 - October 1998 - English

Responsiveness to direct versus indirect hypnotic procedures: The role of resistance as a predictor variable.
GARY GROTH-MARNAT AND KAYE MITCHELL

Abstract: Empirical research attempting to demonstrate that indirectly phrased hypnotic suggestions result in greater responsiveness than direct approaches have generally not shown any differences on formal hypnotizability scales. However, empirical research in related areas along with clinical observation suggests that client resistance might be a crucial moderating variable. Specifically, participants with greater resistance would be expected to be more responsive to indirect approaches whereas those with low levels of resistance would be more responsive to direct hypnotic procedures. To test this hypothesis, participants were given either a standardized test of hypnotic responsiveness which used direct suggestions (Harvard Group Scale of Hypnotizability) or a comparable indirect scale (Alman Wexler Indirect Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale) followed by administration of a measure of resistance (Therapeutic Reactance Scale). The hypothesis was not confirmed in that those with higher (or lower) reactance/resistance did not score differently than those on either the indirect or direct hypnotizability measures.

Infant Communication and the Development of Hypnotic Responsivity
BRIAN VANDENBERG

Abstract: The research on the development of hypnotic responsivity indicates that it emerges, ex nihilo, sometime after the age of three. The measures used to assess hypnotic responsivity rely on complex verbal instructions, thus precluding investigation of infancy. Recent research on infancy, however, suggests that the ontogenesis of hypnotic responsivity is likely to be found in fundamental human capacities that emerge in the first weeks and months of life. The aims of the paper are threefold: Demonstrate that infants possess capacities, on the nonverbal plane of communication, that are analogous to those required for hypnosis; identify situations in infancy that are analogous to the hypnotic context; examine dispositional and relational attributes in infancy that may account for later individual differences in hypnotic responsivity.

Primary Process, Hypnotic Dreams, and the Hidden Observer: Hypnosis versus Alert Imagining
CORNELIA MARE PINNELL, STEVEN JAY LYNN, AND JAMES P. PINNELL

Abstract: Previous research (Mare, Lynn, Kvaal, Segal, & Sivec, 1994) indicated that high hypnotizable participants reported more primary process mentation in hypnotic dreams than did low hypnotizable participants instructed to simulate hypnosis. Differences in primary process were not evidenced in response to instructions for a "hidden part" of the participant to report on the hypnotic dream. The present research replicated and extended these findings by showing that high hypnotizable participants (N = 20) who passed the dream suggestion reported more primary process in their dreams than did high hypnotizable participants instructed to remain alert and think and imagine along with suggestions (N = 20). As in previous research, differences in primary process were not evidenced in response to hidden observer suggestions, and the frequency of dream (87% hypnosis vs. 96% imagining) and hidden observer responses (100% in both groups) was equivalent across hypnotic and nonhypnotic groups. The results provided qualified support for a psychoanalytic model of hypnosis (Nash, 1991) in that differences in primary process were apparent in response to the dream but not the hidden observer suggestion. Imagery and Hypnotizability Revisited

Imagery and Hypnotizability Revisited
MANUELA M KOGON, PAUL JAISUKAITIS, ANNAMARIA BERARDI, MALKEET GUPTA, STEPHEN M KOSSLYN, AND DAVID SPIEGEL

Abstract: The objective of this study was to correlate computer-generated imagery tasks and a self-report measure of imagery ability with hypnotizability, hypothesizing that computer-generated imagery tasks would be better predictors of hypnotizability than the self-report measure. Hypnotizability of 43 subjects was assessed using the Hypnotic Induction Profile and the Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale. Imagery ability was assessed by the Visual Vividness Imagery Questionnaire (VVIQ) and by computer-generated imagery tasks measuring the ability to generate, maintain and transform images. While there was no correlation between the VVIQ and hypnotizability, the less hypnotizable subjects made twice as many mistakes in the spatial imagery tasks than more hypnotizables but this differemce was not statistically significant. The relationships among hypnotic performance, hypnotizability and imagery functions are complex.