Hypnosis has a long and rich history (Gauld, 1992; Laurence & Perry, 1988), dating from the late 18th Century in Paris. During that period, Franz Anton Mesmer gained astonishing popular recognition for what he called Animal Magnetism (the first of several metaphors for what is now called hypnosis). Mesmer believed that there is an invisible animal magnetic force or fluid in the atmosphere which he could harness, store in his body, and transmit to physically ill patients with curative effects.

What is remarkable about Mesmer is that although the historical records of his practice are not always clear, Mesmer obtained major improvements and occasionally complete cures that other medical professionals of his epoch were not able to obtain. This success led him to conclude, erroneously, that Animal Magnetism exists; we now know, however, that the various non-specific placebo factors that are present in healing situations may have been the effective ingredients in his treatment successes. Elements such as hope for a cure or alleviation and faith and trust in the magnetist, and in magnetism, are all likely to have weighed in, just as they do in a variety of healing contexts today.

In 1784, A Royal Commission of Inquiry into Animal Magnetism was established. It was headed by Benjamin Franklin, and included some of the leading scientists of the day such as Lavoisier, the chemist, and Guillotine, the inventor. It performed some quite sophisticated experiments on magnetic phenomena. With the magnetically “adept” person separated from the magnetist by a paper screen so that they could not see each other, the Commissioners found that the patient frequently showed magnetic effects when the magnetist was not magnetizing, and did not show these effects on other occasions when he was. The Commission concluded (correctly) that animal magnetism did not exist, and (incorrectly) that its non-existence meant that it could not have curative effects.

In the true traditions of science, however, the commission provided an alternative explanation of magnetic phenomena, part of which suggested a way in which an ostensibly non-existent entity could, in fact, have curative effects. It concluded that the effects observed were the product of imagination, imitation and touch, and that the main contributing factor was imagination. As will be seen later, imagination still has considerable currency in much theorizing about hypnosis; it is now considered central to understanding the manner in which hypnosis quite often alleviates a variety of medical difficulties, in situations such as clinical pain, where drugs and/or surgery have been ineffective (Melzack & Perry, 1975).

Two other investigators of this period made significant contributions to the understanding of what is now called hypnosis. The Marquis de Puysegur renamed it artificial somnambulism, and placed much emphasis on the notion that magnetic phenomena were most likely to be elicited under conditions of what he called “exclusive rapport” between hypnotist and hypnotized person. The Abbe Jose Custodia di Faria called it lucid sleep, and drew attention to the observation that between 16-20% of the population was highly responsive to it (an estimate not unlike current data on high levels of hypnotic responsivity). Others, including Mesmer, had reported on the differential nature of response to what is now known as hypnosis, but Faria was the first to emphasize it and to make it the cornerstone of his position.

The term “hypnosis” was coined by James Braid, a Manchester surgeon, in his book of 1843. Here he was following the sleep metaphors proposed by Puysegur and Faria, since the term comes from the Greek hypnosis: to sleep. At a superficial level, this is a plausible deduction given that, as Faria observed, such phenomena as sleep walking and talking appear to be duplicated in hypnosis. It was not until the 1950s, with the advent of the technology of the electroencephalogram (EEG) that the sleep metaphor was discarded. The EEG of hypnosis is formally indistinguishable from a pattern of being relaxed, alert with eyes closed. By contrast, the EEG of sleep consists of four distinct polygraph defined stages that run in approximately 90-minute cycles of progressively less depth throughout the night (Aserinsky & Kleitman, 1953).

For much of the 19th Century, another view of hypnosis gradually took hold. This is the belief that hypnosis is a matter of a person’s degree of suggestibility. Unfortunately, this particular conceptualization carries pejorative overtones, implying that response to hypnosis is a matter of gullibility and/or feeble will. Suggestibility theory makes little logical sense, being based upon the observation that because a person responds to a number of suggestions, s/he must be suggestible.

The sleep metaphor came to be reconciled, to a degree, with suggestibility theory in the latter part of the 19th Century in France. A.A. Liebeault saw hypnosis as “artificial sleep” and as indistinguishable from nocturnal sleep. He also viewed suggestion as essential in actuating the hypnotic process, in which the hypnotized person became an automaton, unable to resist the demands of the hypnotist.

Towards the end of the 19th Century, two “schools” of hypnosis emerged in France. Each had views that were frequently opposed diametrically. Hippolyte Bernheim, much influenced by Liebeault, headed a “school” at the University of Nancy, and argued that hypnosis was initiated by suggestion and explained by suggestibility. By contrast, Jean-Martin Charcot at La Salpetriere Hospital in Paris, one of the foremost neurologists of his day, argued that hypnosis is a physio-pathological condition allied to hysteria. At around this time, legal cases involving evidence derived from hypnosis began to be heard by French courts, and both Charcot and Bernheim became deeply involved in the controversy that these legal proceedings generated.

The effect of these legal battles for the study of hypnosis was disastrous in the short term. Not only did Charcot and Bernheim hold almost diametrically opposed views on many issues; both, also, were in error on some of them. Professional interest in hypnosis waned towards the beginning of the 20th Century, as people in the field turned away from this corrosive legal battle, and towards the distinctive views and approach of Sigmund Freud.

For the first three decades of the 20th Century, interest in hypnosis remained in decline, only to be revived by Clark L. Hull, whose 1933 book entitled Hypnosis and suggestibility: An experimental approach was instrumental in rekindling interest in the topic. This renewal of interest was short-lived, however; Hull was forced to abandon the study of hypnosis and to turn his attention to learning theory. Two apocryphal stories exist on why this happened. One is a misguided concern that hypnosis threatened the chastities of female students at his university. An alternative account is that a student who was working at Hull’s lab hypnotized another student, but did not evaluate post-hypnosis alertness. The student left and was hit by a car while crossing the street. The parents threatened to sue Yale University (or did sue it) and the lab was closed. Whatever the reason, the field of hypnosis lost one of its most talented and prolific researchers at a time when it could least afford it.

World War II, however, provided an unexpected reprieve. In the heat of battle, field hospitals often ran short of the drugs needed to treat wounded soldiers. Under often appalling conditions, a small group of clinicians of hypnosis were able to provide pain relief and alleviation of the suffering of their often severely injured patient. Some of these clinicians banded together after the war ended to form the Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis (SCEH); it held its first meeting in 1949. Unfortunately, as a result of some major disputes on clinical issues within SCEH, some clinicians, spearheaded by Milton Erickson, went on to form the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis (ASCH) in 1957.

The period between 1960 and 1990 is likely to be seen by future historians as halcyon days for hypnosis. During this period, three major hypnosis research laboratories developed in the United States. One was at Stanford University under the direction of Ernest and Josephine Hilgard. A second one was at the University of Pennsylvania (after a brief inaugural period at Harvard University) under the guidance of Martin T. Orne, Emily Carota Orne and (in later years) David F. Dinges. A third one was at Medfield Hospital in Massachusetts under the auspices of Theodore C. Barber. Unfortunately, the Stanford and Medfield laboratories are no more; by contrast the Philadelphia Laboratory continues to thrive.

These three laboratories had a profound effect on younger clinicians and researchers who entered the field of hypnosis during this period; indeed, many of them received some of their doctoral and/or post-doctoral training at either Stanford, Pennsylvania or Medfield. In addition, strong national societies of hypnosis sprang up in many countries, and, gradually, some international structures to link them. With the ease and speed of travel provided by the aviation industry, the study of hypnosis became international in a manner hitherto not envisaged. The upshot of these developments is that, for future investigators of the 21st Century, there exists a solid empirical, clinical and forensic base upon which to build. But there are lessons from Nancy and Salpetriere that must be remembered — always

Source: Memory and Reality