PSYC1003 Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Franz Mesmer, Asthma, The Good Feeling
Document Summary
Hypnosis brings up a lot of notions, many of which are wrong. Mesmer (source of the term mesmerize ) has a lot to do with the questionable ideas surrounding hypnosis. There"s agreement that the hypnotist is less important than the subject"s openness to suggestion. The degree depends on their openness to suggestion. They can be led to smell things, or ignore a smell, like a bottle of ammonia. The idea that it"s in there, i just can"t get to it, but hypnosis helps, is wrong. Hypnosis usually mixes fact with fiction, just like our regular memories. A good example is people who think they"ve been abducted by ufos. Memory with what they"ve come to understand is a typical ufo abduction. The answer to this question seems to be, no. The evidence suggests that when people follow a hypnotist, they"re largely doing it to be good subjects , not mindless robots.
