Clinical Hypnosis
What is Hypnosis?
According to Division 30 (Psychological Hypnosis) of the American Psychological Association, hypnosis is defined as “A state of consciousness involving focused attention and reduced peripheral awareness characterized by an enhanced capacity for response to suggestion” (Elkins, Barabasz, Council, & Spiegel, 2015, American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis). Though not without its naysayers, many clinicians and researchers in the clinical hypnosis world have embraced this definition.
APA Division 30 did a reasonable job defining trance but not hypnosis. Unfortunately, these two terms are often conflated and used interchangeably. Some may even say, “I hypnotized my patient today” or “I put her in hypnosis” as if hypnosis was indeed a state of mind and something the clinician does to the patient or client.
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Let’s first consider the terms trance and hypnosis:
Trance
According to Miriam-Webster trance is defined as “a sleeplike state (as of deep hypnosis) usually characterized by partly suspended animation with diminished or absent sensory and motor activity” and “a state of profound abstraction or absorption.” If you examine the APA Division 30 definition of hypnosis you will note a number of similarities.
Trance is a natural human phenomena that is ever present during our waking states. Did you ever lose track of time, forget why you walked into a room, fail to see something you were looking for when it was right in front of your eyes, become absorbed by an engrossing movie or page-turning novel? THAT’S TRANCE.
Some consider trance to be an altered state of consciousness. In my opinion, trance is an altering state of consciousness. Trance does not involve an “on-and-off” switch, rather consider it a “dimmer” switch. It ebbs and flows throughout our waking experiences. Trance involves focused and absorbed attention that can be healthy and healing or unhealthy and destructive. Examples of unhealthy and destructive trance include pain, depression, and anxiety. Again, trance involves focused and absorbed attention. When people walk into my office or more recently appear on my computer screen, I consider their trance experience and strategically identify and apply hypnotic interventions intended to shift, modify, and sometimes manipulate their unhealthy trance experience to a healthier one.
Hypnosis
That brings me to the term hypnosis. Rather than being a state of mind, hypnosis can be defined as a set of therapeutic skills and interventions used by a trained clinician for facilitating and enhancing healthier trance experiences that ultimately improve one’s performance in life (i.e., depression, anxiety, pain, athletic performance, sleep, etc.).
At times, I hear some clinicians say things like, “When I put him in trance” or “When I hypnotized this patient” or “When I pulled her out of hypnosis.” Statements such as these imply that the clinician using hypnosis does something to someone. Unfortunately, this perspective, I believe, continues to foster and facilitate one frequently misunderstood myth about hypnosis: The clinician is in charge and the client is a passive participant lacks any sense of control. This could not be further from the truth. In fact, if hypnosis is successful and effective, your clients should be able to report having a greater sense of control.
Words matter, and this is why I believe it is important to distinguish between the terms “trance” and “hypnosis.” Let’s not continue to conflate these words.
As for the term “hypnotherapy,” I suggest we abandon it altogether. Hypnosis, like many therapeutic interventions involves the application of many tools for assisting others with enhancing performance in their lives. Hypnosis is not a specialized therapy like “Cognitive Behavioral Therapy” and can be utilized by many clinicians other than mental health professionals. Certainly dentists, nurse practitioners, physicians from all kinds of specialties (e.g., Anesthesiologists, Cardiologists, Dermatologists, Pediatricians, etc.) can apply clinical hypnosis in their respective practices, yet they would not consider it “hypnotherapy.”