International Handbook of Clinical Hypnosis - E-Lib FK UWKS

42 INTERNATIONAL HANDBOOK OF CLINICAL HYPNOSIS
or ®xed attention. Such an experience can then be compared to their hypnotic
trance. It is also helpful to share with clients that brain wave studies of subjects
`under hypnosis' show an alert brain wave pattern, and not that of a deep sleep
state.
3 The trance will be irreversible. The client may ask `Can I come out of this?'
This fear that once in a trance state the client will be unable to terminate the trance
is founded on the belief that something is being done to him or her. It suggests
there is an external locus of control for the hypnotic process. It is useful to compare
the hypnotic partnership to the roles of guide and pioneer. The hypnotist is a
teaching guide, the client may choose whether and when to follow, and the client
rapidly learns the terrain already familiar to the clinician.
4 The hypnotist will have power over the client, over their behaviour, their
thoughts, over their wills. The client may fear that a suggestion will violate a moral
or ethical code. `Will I bark like a dog?' `Will I talk about something I don't want
to talk about?' These concerns often re¯ect the client's exposure to the portrayal of
hypnosis in the entertainment industry. Lay hypnotists, unlike hypnotists in the
professional health ®elds, lack clinical training and all too often lack concern for
the subject's privacy, psychological well-being or moral codes. It is the clinician's
responsibility to teach hypnosis adhering to the codes of ethics of his or her
profession and to teach the client to discriminate between the ethical and unethical
uses of hypnosis.
Each of these beliefs carries a concern about who is in control. This underlies the
important clinical construct that all hypnosis is self-hypnosis. It is useful to teach
this to clients and it may serve to lay the foundation for the later teaching of selfhypnotic
procedures.
Some other valuable constructs which are important to explain to the client
include de®ning and describing absorption, concentration, focused attention, and
dissociation. The commonness of absorption or what is termed the `everyday
trance' can be illustrated by experiences of automaticity shared by many, such as
automobile driving behaviours, tooth brushing and other repetitious behaviours.
The focused attention or concentration of hypnosis may be compared to the state
one experiences while at prayer, or while reading a highly absorbing novel. The
state of shock one is in following an injury or accident can be likened to the
experience of dissociation.
There is variability in hypnotic talent and skill. Discussion of this point is helpful
in building positive expectancies that practice will make a difference in hypnotic
responsiveness over time. Hypnotizability scales may be used to assess degree of
hypnotizability.
Discussion about memory and hypnosis is an important requirement of the preinduction
talk. Memory is imperfect, productive, and reproductive both in and
outside of hypnosis. Some hypnotic techniques metaphorically suggest that events
in memory will be retrieved as they happened or were encoded e.g. the TV screen