Concepts of Hypnosis
This is a contested concept with many different information. How something is not palpable, the concept also becomes somewhat abstract. There are several types of references to talk about hypnosis, but in a group generally agreed with the definition that you see below:
Hypnosis is an alternative state of heightened awareness, where the subject remains awake all the time, experiencing sensations, feelings, perhaps with pictures, regressions, anesthesia and other hypnotic phenomena while in this state.
You are more internal, more focused, more awake. During trance, you'll be turning off the external perceptions and has a large internal activity, without losing their alertness.
It is a natural state of expanded consciousness different from wakefulness. The name given by James Braind, hypnosis (a state resembling sleep), with respect to the similarity in this state.
According to the dictionary, "mental state similar to sleep, caused artificially, and in which the individual is still able to follow the suggestions made by the hypnotist."
According to Milton H. Erickson, "increases susceptibility to suggestion, having the effect
a change in sensory and motor skills to start an appropriate behavior. "
Some authors consider hypnosis an "altered" state of consciousness. This is a controversial term (as amended), it has an ominous tone.
For the American Psychological Association, published in 1993 in the definition, hypnosis is a procedure during which a health professional or researcher suggests that a client, patient or individual to experience changes in sensations, perceptions, thoughts or behavior.
But even the entire conceptualization attempted to date can not encompass the entire wealth of experience of hypnosis, which, by means of hypnotic phenomena, enables a person to produce new learning to use the wisdom of your unconscious to your service.
For Erickson, the trance is a state of artificially heightened suggestibility and similar but not equal to sleep, which seems to be a natural separation of conscious and unconscious elements of the psyche. "Trance is a period in which a person has limitations as they relate to their structure and common reference and beliefs, are temporarily altered, so that the patient becomes receptive to patterns, associations and patterns of functioning thatlead to problem solving.. "
For Gilligan, the hypnotic trance would be "an interactional sequence, experientially absorbing, which produces a special state of consciousness, in which autoexpressões automatically begin to occur."
We can give a definition: hypnosis would be absorbing the attention of the subject. Attention was focused by an induction or a self-inflicted, absorbing the attention of the conscious mind, and this would give opportunity to the unconscious mind to manifest by means of hypnotic phenomena. The person then experiences a different state of consciousness, with the conscious mind focused and alert in part, while your unconscious mind tries various ways to express the riches of the unconscious.
The hypnotic phenomena appear in different ways. Each is unique trance. Not necessarily the person enters into a trance in the same way. May vary: variation of intensity, depth and phenomena that occur.
The hypnotic phenomena are: rapport, catalepsy, amnesia, anesthesia, analgesia, regression, progression, hallucinations, positive, negative hallucinations.
The suggestion is part of the trance. Auto-suggestion as well. The suggestion would be a communication associated with a cause that so influences the absorption of the conscious mind, which is focused on some kind of absorption sensory and ideational.Thus, there is the opportunity to manifest the unconscious mind, to varying degrees, by means of hypnotic phenomena. Established trust, rapport, there is access to the unconscious and some kind of change occurs.
COMMUNICATION INFLUENCE + = HYPNOSIS
ABSORPTION OF ATTENTION OF CONSCIOUS MIND
- Of sensations, feelings, perceptions
Eliciting unconscious MIND
-The appearance of hypnotic phenomena
1 + 2 = trance
ABSORPTION OF CONSCIOUS MIND MORE
THE EMERGENCE OF hypnotic phenomena
Leads to change.
In short:
All the theories so far developed are useful, but could not define hypnosis and give the last word in the description of the process and hypnotic experience.
It can be considered as a state of consciousness different from wakefulness. It also occurs in the waking state, the day-to-day as a natural phenomenon.
It is considered a state of focused attention, an absorption: the conscious mind focuses attention and something special (perceptions, thoughts, images, stories, love, etc..) And there is a dissociation of the unconscious mind (automatic).
What is known is that something happens that is different from simply being awake. There is a focus of attention to what is internal. It is now also apply to internal reality created by the person. It may involve all or some relaxation and hypnotic phenomena.
Normally, it is induced, or even self-induced. The good relationship between the two parties is an important condition.Rapport builds trust, openness, and makes the one who guides can be heard and treated in his power to absorb the attention.The rest is the guy who is being hypnotized. Hypnosis occurs by the interaction of two parts.
Physiology of Hypnosis
Hypnosis happens so often it seems imperceptible. Some patients even do not believe they were hypnotized, for they heard, felt and were critical of everything that was happening during the process of hypnotic induction.
Even the neurophysiological findings of images such as MRI, fMRI and PET, appear only in people highly susceptible to hypnosis.Even people with low susceptibility are mesmerized as they are not active, your brain does not present the findings that appear in the most susceptible.
But those who are susceptible to hypnosis, we have some interesting findings. According to Dr. Marlus Vinicius Ferreira, without my book Hypnosis in Clinical Practice, you can check:
Lower latency for certain potential somatosensory and auditory;
Generation in EEG theta activity, which can originate in the hippocampus and associated with focused attention and inhibitory processes. The theta activity, from 6.5 Hz to 8 Hz, occurs more and more in the left posterior regions, compared with people less susceptible to hypnosis. The beta activity between 12.5 Hz and 12 Hz, it occurs more and more in the right posterior regions;
During hypnotic induction, the EEG spectral analysis shows the increase in spectral amplitude of 40 Hz, indicative of greater ability to focus attention ... Awakening focused;
The pattern of the fractal dimension of the EEG is more consistent with the imaginative processes in highly susceptible to hypnosis;
Information processing to more automatic;
MRI examination with the highest volume in the region of the rostrum of the corpus callosum.
All that said above seems difficult to understand for everyone. But what is important is that the brain slows down, more focused and the person is more automated. Everything happens for a slower rate.
There are different types of response to hypnotic trance:
Some are more focused, activating the frontal cortex;
Others see images, activating the occipital cortex, and
Others have more emotions, activating the limbic system.
This does not mean that to be hypnotized, you must activate the three regions at the same time. But can too! You see people go into trances in various ways. Some linger, others go faster. Some have the facility to see images, others to relax, others to be touched.
Source: Handbook of Ericksonian Hypnosis / Dr. Sofia Bauer
