Right And Lefthemispheric Functioning In Trance 1
In our efforts to conceptualize Erickson's understanding of trance and its facilitation we have used a number of different models 1. The psychodynamic model of the conscious-unconscious system 2. The learning theory model of behavioral psychology 3. A linguistic model utilizing multiple levels of communication. From this session it is finally clear that a neuropsychological model utilizing the differences between right- and left-hemispheric functioning is also implicit in Erickson's work, even...
b Indirect Approaches to Hypnotic Suggestion
Wetterstrand 1902 , who was one of Bernheim's foremost students, described the problem of suggestion in a manner that places Erickson's indirect approaches in proper historical perspective. Suggestion, or rather suggestibility, is composed of two elements ability to receive an impulse from without, and the ideo-plastic faculty. The power that ideas possess to influence physiological conditions. As these are absolutely independent of each other, we must distinguish between them. There are...
Contingent Suggestions And Associational Networks
Another form of compound suggestion is used when Erickson arranges conditions such that a patient's normal flow of voluntary responses is made contingent on the execution of a hypnotic suggestion the contingent suggestion . A hypnotic response that may be low in a patient's behavioral hierarchy is associated with a pattern of responses high on the patient's behavioral repertory and usually already in the process of taking place. Patients find that the momentum of ongoing behavior is too...
Hand Levitation Induction Dissociation by Implication
E Now direct your attention to your right hand. Pause Your right hand may have a tendency to move upward. Pause It begins to quiver and move up toward your face. S's arm does begin to levitate to her face. When your hand touches your face, you can take a deep breath, E You see. she is looking at a hand. Where is the rest of her R The implication is that she has lost the rest of her body. So this is effecting a dissociation, and a dissociation is a characteristic of trance. So as soon as this...
Contradictions
Revealing contradictions within patients' minds demonstrates the inadequacy of their usual beliefs and prepares the way for a positive attitude toward an experience with therapeutic trance. Erickson makes something of a game of this as he helps a patient to realize contradictions between thought and feeling and, of course, between the conscious and unconscious. He frequently uses ideomotor movements as a proof of these contradictions. Thus, when a patient protests that an important memory is...
Trance Characteristics
S Now, I'm trying to think better. It was kind of hard to think, flashing around in that state. R In the trance it's harder to think S Another thing flashed into my mind when Dr. Erickson mentioned going back and assuming another identity. I used the name Amy for a while in high school because we were all using different names. When you mentioned Ann Margaret, that Amy identity flashed in my mind. S continues to recount other memories of her teen years that she touched upon in trance. E How...
The Apposition of Opposites
That is a facility in behaving that serves many good purposes. And you should enjoy learning to forget not only ideas Purposely forgetting that you know a certain name when you decided you liked a different name and perhaps for a half day you entertained that your name was Darlene or Ann Margaret S appears to renew her slow head nodding at this point in apparent recognition or acceptance of what is being said. E This is a very common game among children and it reminds her of a forgotten game. R...