 The views of what hypnosis is have differentiated throughout history and into current times.  Is it a trance?  Is it a cure for illnesses?  Is it related to sleep and dreaming?  Is it a separate and unique state of awareness?

 Hypnosis was used in religious and healing ceremonies before any records of hypnosis existed.  The study of ceremonies of primitive people in Africa, Australia, and elsewhere performed inductions by rhythmic chanting, monotonous drumbeats, together with strained fixations of the eyes accompanied by catalepsy of the rest of the body.

 Nicholas Spanos ( ) Ph.D., professor of psychology at Carlten University in Ottawa Canada.  Spanos, a social cognitive psychologist, was not convinced by previous views of hypnosis and exposed it to scientific scrutiny.  He theorized that the behaviors during hypnosis were actually normal, voluntary abilities of humans, and not an altered state of consciousness.

 2 Groups were created one group was told to raise their arm. The other group was given a suggestion. They were told “your arm is light and rising”.  They were then asked whether they believed their behavior was involuntary or not. The group told to raise their arm said their actions were voluntary while the group that was told your arm is light and rising said their behavior was involuntary. .

 Two groups were created. One group was told that it is natural for the arm to become rigid during hypnosis. The other group was not told this. Both groups were hypnotized and the group that was told their arms would become rigid, got rigid arms.  They were then asked whether they believed their behavior was involuntary or not. The group who was told to have rigid arms believed that their behavior was involuntary

 Spanos conducted an experiment involving pain. One group was told that they would use waking analgesia techniques before being tested using hypnotic pain–reduction methods. In the second group, they were not told of the later hypnotic test. The first group said they felt less pain during the hypnotic state than they did during the waking state. The second group felt the same amount of pain both times.  Conclusion: The group that expected hypnosis, according to Spanos, expected that the pain under hypnosis would be less.

 Spanos wasn’t trying to prove that hypnosis doesn’t exist. He wanted to prove that hypnotic behaviors are the result of highly motivated, goal-directed social behavior, not an altered state of consciousness.  There is still controversy over Spanos’s findings. Even today we still don’t know if hypnosis is an altered state of conciousness.  Spanos’s work has been used to criticize certain theraputic practices such as summoning up lost memories of the past from patients of sexual abuse. They use Sponos’s studies to show that hypnosis may distort memories or even create memories of abuse.