Hypnotherapy

Hypnotherapy as a treatment for illness has been occurring for hundreds of years but has been steeped in mysticism and quackery. Hypnotherapy only began to gain credibility as a viable intervention in the last century. In particular, 20th-century psychiatrist Milton Erickson was a strong proponent of hypnotherapy as a treatment for mental and physical health conditions. Let’s take a closer look at hypnotherapy as a viable mental health treatment.

What is hypnotherapy?

Hypnosis is an altered state of consciousness that allows the individual to enter a deeper condition of concentration and awareness. While hypnosis can make one more mentally alert, it is also associated with feelings of calm and relaxation. Hypnosis has the potential to increase suggestibility and facilitate self-understanding. These hypnotic states are utilized by the therapist to perform hypnotherapy.

Hypnotherapy steps

1. Relaxation: The mind must be relaxed for induction to occur. Numerous relaxation methods can be used, from deep breathing to progressive muscle relaxation.
2. Induction: Induction is the process where someone is put into a hypnotic state. While relaxation alone might cause induction, there are numerous other ways to perform induction, including counting and visual cues.
3. Work: The work stage is where the change happens. This is when the hypnotherapist uses the techniques illustrated below to meet the client’s goals.
4. Exit: The exit is when you release the client from their hypnotic state. Although this would happen normally over time, the hypnotherapist can do this quickly by defining a certain cue. For example, “When I count backward from three, you will no longer be hypnotized”.

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Hypnotherapy techniques

The following techniques are commonly used as part of hypnotherapy:

Direct Suggestion

This is what most people think of when hypnotherapy is mentioned. While in a hypnotic state, the therapist can offer suggestions that facilitate the goals of the client. If the client is working to curb smoking, for instance, the therapist can suggest that smoking is “poisonous" and will harm the body. When the client comes out of the hypnotic condition, they will hopefully feel like smoking is poisonous and want to reduce their usage.

Indirect suggestion

A favorite of Erickson, an indirect suggestion gives the client the illusion of choice. Instead of commanding the client to perform a specific behavior or telling them something directly, the therapist will indirectly mention it and allow the client to decide what they want to do with the suggestion. For example, a therapist will say to the client, “You may notice how much better you feel when you don’t smoke”, hoping the client’s mind will run with the suggestion and stop smoking.

Regression

In this technique, the therapist guides the subject to explore and uncover past experiences that may be the cause of problematic behavior. After this initial uncovering phase, the therapist helps the client reframe the past events and find more adaptive ways of coping. Regression is particularly helpful in resolving past trauma or other troubles that may be stuck in the subconscious mind and difficult to access.

Parts

The parts technique theorizes that the subconscious mind has different parts, both helpful and unhelpful. The conflict between the parts leads to negative emotions and maladaptive behavior. The hypnotherapist guides the client to identify the damaging parts and find a healthier alternative part to replace them. For example, the client who wants to stop smoking may—through hypnosis—identify the subconscious “devil” and the “angel” within them and learn to vanquish the devil so they can stop smoking.

Does hypnotherapy work?

The effectiveness of hypnotherapy is controversial. Although there is substantial research measuring its efficacy, these studies have traditionally lacked strong psychometric properties. When better research designs have been employed, the results have been largely inconclusive.

Some recent studies, however, point to the potential for hypnotherapy as a mental health treatment for specific problems:

• One of the best-designed studies involves a randomized investigation of depression. In this study, hypnotherapy was as effective as cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) in reducing depressive symptoms. This may be the first validated and reliable research to ever reach that conclusion.

• Alleviating pain is also a frequent target of hypnotherapy. Hypnosis has been used as a replacement or adjunct to analgesics before and after surgeries. In one meta-analysis, hypnotherapy was found to reduce the need for conventional analgesics. Of course, some of those studies were not highly credible due to poor psychometric properties.

• Smoking cessation is another problem for which hypnotherapy is frequently employed. In one study, hypnosis did at least as well as behavioral counseling in reducing smoking behavior.

• In another meta-analysis, researchers found a small number that asserted that hypnosis was significantly effective in reducing symptoms of PTSD. However, more research is needed to make a definitive conclusion.