Hockenbury Discovering Psychology 5th txtbk

Hypnosis161Age Regression Through Hypnosis? Somepeople believe that hypnosis can allow youto re-experience an earlier stage of yourlife—a phenomenon called age regression(J. Green, 1999b). Under hypnosis, someadults do appear to relive experiencesfrom their childhood, confidently displayingchildlike speech patterns and behaviors.However, when attempts are made toverify specific details of the experiences,the details are usually inaccurate (Spanos,1987–1988). Just as actual deafness andblindness are not produced by hypnoticsuggestion, neither is a true return tochildhood. Instead, hypnotic subjects combinefragments of actual memories withfantasies and ideas about how children ofa particular age should behave.Many studies have shown that efforts to enhance memories hypnotically can leadto distortions and inaccuracies. In fact, hypnosis can greatly increase confidence inmemories that are actually incorrect. False memories, also called pseudomemories, canbe inadvertently created when hypnosis is used to aid recall (Mazzoni & Scoboria,2007; Lynn & others, 2003).Explaining HypnosisConsciousness Divided?How can hypnosis be explained? Psychologist Ernest R. Hilgard (1986a, 1991,1992) believed that the hypnotized person experiences dissociation—the splittingof consciousness into two or more simultaneous streams of mental activity. Accordingto Hilgard’s neodissociation theory of hypnosis, a hypnotized person consciouslyexperiences one stream of mental activity that is responding to the hypnotist’ssuggestions. But a second, dissociated stream of mental activity is alsooperating, processing information that is unavailable to the consciousness of thehypnotized subject. Hilgard (1986a, 1992) referred to this second, dissociatedstream of mental activity as the hidden observer. (The phrase hidden observer doesnot mean that the hypnotized person has multiple personalities.)Hilgard accidentally discovered the “hidden observer” while conducting aclassroom demonstration. Hilgard hypnotized a student and induced hypnoticdeafness. The student was completely unresponsive to very loud, sudden sounds,such as the sound of a starter pistol firing or of wooden blocks being bangedtogether.Another student, observing the demonstration, asked Hilgard if “some part” ofthe hypnotized person was actually aware of the sounds. Hilgard instructed thehypnotized student to raise his right index finger if some part of him could stillhear. To Hilgard’s surprise, the hypnotized student’s right index finger rose! Whenbrought out of hypnosis, the student had no recall of any sounds during the hypnoticallyinduced deafness, including Hilgard’s suggestion to raise his index finger.Hypnosis, it seems, had produced a split in consciousness. A conscious segmentcomplied with the hypnotic suggestion of deafness, but a separate, dissociated segmentunavailable to consciousness—the hidden observer—continued to processinformation.Not all psychologists agree that hypnotic phenomena are due to dissociation, dividedconsciousness, or a hidden observer. In the Critical Thinking box on the nextpage, we examine this controversy more fully.dissociationThe splitting of consciousness into two ormore simultaneous streams of mentalactivity.neodissociation theory of hypnosisTheory proposed by Ernest Hilgard thatexplains hypnotic effects as being due tothe splitting of consciousness into twosimultaneous streams of mental activity,only one of which the hypnotic participantis consciously aware of during hypnosis.hidden observerHilgard’s term for the hidden, or dissociated,stream of mental activity that continuesduring hypnosis.