Dec 11, 2022

Greater self-consciousness linked to decreased hypnotizability, study finds

Emily Manis
PsyPost
December 8, 2022

Have you ever wondered what makes someone vulnerable to hypnosis? A study published in the International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis suggests that being self-conscious can make individual’s less susceptible to being hypnotized. 

Hypnotism is frequently thought of as a gimmick done by magicians, but it can also be a utilized as a psychological intervention. Theories about how hypnosis functions indicate that there is a decrease in self-awareness and/or attention that is necessary for that influence. There may be an aspect of hypnosis requiring less competition with other aspects of cognitive functioning. 

Hypnotizability has been found to be linked to many individual traits, but there has been limited research exploring how different aspects of self-consciousness relate to hypnotizability. This study seeks to bridge that gap in literature. 

correlations showed small effect sizes. Additionally, utilizing only an undergraduate sample from California limits generalizability. Future research could utilize a more diverse participant pool. 

“Besides taking into consideration these limitations, future studies should consider making more focused analyses looking at the potential relations between self-consciousness, gender, trait dissociation, and hypnotic experiential automaticity, discontinuity, and absorption,” the researchers concluded. “Only the latter has received much research attention. In addition, aspects of self-consciousness could be manipulated experimentally to evaluate any impact on hypnotic responsiveness. In sum, there are multiple reasons to continue investigating how different aspects of self-consciousness may relate to hypnotic experience and hypnotizability.” 

The study, “Dispositional Self-Consciousness and Hypnotizability“, was authored by Etzel Cardeña, Lena Lindström, Ann Åström, and Philip G. Zimbardo.



No comments: