Hypnosis really changes your mind

From New Scientist Magazine

Hypnosis is more than just a party trick, it measurably changes how the brain works, says a UK researcher.

Hypnosis significantly affects the activity in a part of the brain responsible for detecting and responding to errors, says John Gruzelier, a psychologist at Imperial College in London. Using functional brain imaging, he also found that hypnosis affects an area that controls higher level executive functions.

"This explains why, under hypnosis, people can do outrageous things that ordinarily they wouldn't dream of doing," says Gruzelier, who presented his study at the British Association for the Advancement of Science Festival in Exeter, UK.

The finding is one of the first to indicate a biological mechanism underpinning the experience of hypnosis. Gruzelier hopes it will also benefit emerging research showing, for example, that hypnosis can help cancer patients deal with painful treatments.

Highly susceptible

Gruzelier and his colleagues studied brain activity using an fMRI while subjects completed a standard cognitive exercise, called the Stroop task.

The team screened subjects before the study and chose 12 that were highly susceptible to hypnosis and 12 with low susceptibility. They all completed the task in the fMRI under normal conditions and then again under hypnosis.

Throughout the study, both groups were consistent in their task results, achieving similar scores regardless of their mental state. During their first task session, before hypnosis, there were no significant differences in brain activity between the groups.

But under hypnosis, Gruzelier found that the highly susceptible subjects showed significantly more brain activity in the anterior cingulate gyrus than the weakly susceptible subjects. This area of the brain has been shown to respond to errors and evaluate emotional outcomes.

The highly susceptible group also showed much greater brain activity on the left side of the prefrontal cortex than the weakly susceptible group. This is an area involved with higher level cognitive processing and behaviour.

You can discover from just one session of hypnotherapy your own potential for change.

There is evidence also to suggest that with practice, even if you have a lower susceptibility to hypnosis, you can develop this capability.

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WHAT is HYPNOSIS?

Hypnosis is a method of communication that induces a trance or a trance-like state.

Trance is a naturally occurring state in which one's attention is narrowly focused and relatively free of distractions.

When hypnotised, one’s attention is usually internally focussed on thoughts, images or inner dialogue (self talk).

Hypnotherapy and Psychotherapy

Psychotherapy typically but not always, involves two persons, the therapist and the client.

The therapist will listen carefully and non-judgmentally to the client as the situation causing the client distress or difficulty is revealed and explored for possible progressive resolution.

This is a respectful and interactive communication that can often provide insight and possibilities for change without “formal” trance being facilitated.

As an adjunct to psychotherapy, hypnotherapy can help clients enter a comfortable, trance state, potentially to find as yet, undiscovered abilities to help make positive change.

With clinical hypnosis, suggestions are facilitated through the use of hypnotic language patterns. This is designed to bypass the usual regulation by the conditioned, critical and analytical tendency of the thinking “mind”.

Hypnotic language patterns include: guided visualization, stories, memories, analogies, ambiguous words or phrases, repetition, and statements intended to elicit deeper insights.

Unique experience

The experience of hypnosis is subjective for each client (not generic).

General characteristics however, such as feeling heavy or light, seeing vivid images, dissociation from the body, subtle rapid eye movements, relaxed muscle tone and others are common.

Although the potency of suggestion using trance can be extraordinarily effective in improving an individual’s personal situation e.g. reducing anxiety or obviating panic attacks; suggestions will not be accepted by the client if it is not seen as in their own interest.

Hypnosis cannot cause us to do something against our will or compromise our established values.

Hypnosis can open the door to inner resources that perhaps have remained dormant below one’s usual level of awareness, waiting to be awakened.

Responsibility is with the client to take action to get the results they want or need and often assignments or homework re-enforced by hypnosis becomes a useful motivator.

Applications of Hypnotherapy

Just a few important ones:

• Stress reduction (this is often immediate and sustainable)

• Pain management

• Phobias, Fears and Anxiety

• Sleep Disorders Interpersonal Problems

• Depression

• Sexual Difficulties

• Academic Performance

• Athletic Performance

• Blocks to Motivation and Creativity

•  Grief and Loss

Overview of hypnosis from the American Cancer Society

Hypnosis is one of several methods that have been approved by an independent panel, convened by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), as a useful complementary therapy for treating chronic pain. Hypnosis may also be effective in reducing fear and anxiety, treating pain during labour and delivery, reducing labour time, and controlling bleeding and pain during dental procedures.

There is no scientific evidence that hypnosis can influence the development or progression of cancer, however as anxiety and fear will suppress the immune system (increased levels of cortisol, an immunosuppressant occur with elevated stress), by accessing deeper relaxed states of physiological and mental activity, it can help to improve the quality of life for many people with cancer.

Can Hypnosis help with Weight Control?

Hypnosis has been shown to be especially favourable in the treatment of obesity (Kirsch, I., Montgomery, G., & Sapirstein, G.1995), where individuals in the hypnosis group continued to lose weight even after formal treatment had ended.

In one study, for example, women who received personally tailored hypnotic suggestions for specific food aversions, in the context of a traditional self-monitoring and goal-setting treatment, lost approximately twice as much weight as a comparison group.

Can Hypnosis Help People Stop Smoking?

Where the person is appropriately motivated, as in the obesity study described earlier, hypnosis may offer a boost to treatment. A single-session hypnotic treatment has an advantage over other cognitive methods that tend to be longer term.

Finally

Before you start to use hypnosis for your self-improvement, clarify in your own mind why you want to change. This clear intention to change will help the hypnotic suggestions to take hold and manifest themselves in your everyday life.

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