How would the following impact on suggestibility, if at all?
Age
Age would have a significant impact on suggestibility. Children would be highly suggestible because they have been less conditioned by life and are use to being told what to do. They also have good imaginations because they tend to believe in fairly tales and wonderlands. On the other hand, elderly people maybe less suggestible due to the conditioning life has had on them. They will also have a presumed idea of hypnosis from what they have seen on TV. As mature adults they are use to being in control of their lives and may show resistance to hypnotherapy. There may also be an aspect of them being set in their ways and not willing to accept something new. Some older people tend to rubbish things thy do not understand and can be quite stubborn about it.
PTSD
A client with post traumatic stress disorder will usually be highly suggestible. This is because, by the very nature of PTSD, they relive the images of their trauma in their minds. They can visualise vivid details of their trauma as well as smells, sounds and feelings. For this reason someone who sufferers with PTSD would be very suggestible..
OCD
A client with obsessive compulsive disorder would be of low suggestibility. This is due to the controlling nature of the disorder. If someone lives their lives trying to control every single detail of it there are not going to be very suggestible because they will also try to control the session and resist trance. However, in some cases confusion may lead to the acceptance of alternative suggestions
Eating disorder
A client suffering from anorexia will not be very suggestible. Again, control is the nature of the disorder. Someone with this disorder will be so programmed to control every aspect of their existence (food, environment, weight) that they would naturally try to control their behaviour within a session and be less likely to accept suggestions. For these reasons someone with anorexia would not be highly suggestible. However, someone suffering from bulimia has very little control as they feel the need to binge and throw up uncontrollably. This is a way of finding comfort for them. Bulimia is anxiety based so a sufferer will be plenty of internal construction going on. They may well find comfort in hypnotherapy and feel more in control as a result.
Highly emotional
Highly emotional people tend not to see this as they really are. They tend to over dramatise or over react. This makes them highly suggestible because they are able to create scenarios in their minds and believe them. This type of client would also benefit hugely from cognitive behavioural therapy.
Low self esteem
People with low self esteem tend to be quite negative and down on themselves. This can lead to them thinking that they ‘can’t do it’ or there is something wrong with them, they are not as good as others etc. All of this creates a barrier to suggestibility and therefore can make them low on the suggestibility scale. However, in most cases the client is looking for a solution and is willing to be open to suggestion. Ego strengthening is advisable with this type of client.
Fearful
This depends a great deal on what the client is fearful of. If, for example; the client is afraid of looking silly or making a fool of themselves, they may not be very suggestible, as this is a control issue and they will try to control there behaviour and the session. However, if the client’s fears are irrational, like demons or monsters them they may well be very suggestible as they have the ability to create images and unreal scenarios.
Analytical
Analytical people tend not to be very suggestible. This is due to the fact that they question everything and need evidence of some things validity. There spend most of their time preoccupied with looking for fact and truth in everything. For these reasons someone who is analytical would not be very suggestible. Suggestions should be used sparingly with this type of client. A more confusional or overload approach should be taken.
Musical
It is thought that musical people are highly suggestible because they are creative, have imagination and they can somehow visualise music. However, I’m not totally convinced that you can put all musicians in this pigeon hole. I know a lot of musicians and I know some very analytical musicians who would not be very suggestible. I think suggesting that all musical people are suggestible is a bit like suggesting that all women are suggestible because we are seen to be emotional beings. This type of client would respond well to auditory modalities.
Thursday, 10 September 2009
Saturday, 22 August 2009
False memory
What are false memories? Because of the reconstructive nature of memory, some memories may be distorted through influences such as the incorporation of new information. There are also believed-in imaginings that are not based in historical reality; these have been called false memories, pseudo-memories and memory illusions. They can result from the influence of external factors, such as the opinion of an authority figure or information repeated in the culture. An individual with an internal desire to please, to get better or to conform can easily be affected by such influences.
The idea of repression of early traumatic memories is a concept that many psychotherapists readily accept. In fact, it has been said that repression is the foundation on which psychoanalysis rests. According to the theory, something happens that is so shocking that the mind grabs hold of the memory and pushes it underground, into some inaccessible corner of the unconscious. There it sleeps for years, or even decades, or even forever–isolated from the rest of mental life. Then, one day, it may rise up and emerge into consciousness. Numerous clinical examples fitting this model can be readily found. Many of these examples involve memory of childhood trauma, such as sexual abuse, that allegedly has been repressed for decades until recovered in therapy. Rieker and Carmen (1986) described a woman who entered psychotherapy for sexual dysfunction and recovered memories of incest committed by her father. Schuker (1979) described a woman who entered psychotherapy for chronic insomnia, low self-esteem, and other problems and recovered memories of her father sexually assaulting her. M. Williams (1987) described a man who entered therapy for depression and sleep disturbances and recovered memories of a servant molesting him. These reports represent the clinical evidence that clients do indeed manage later to remember some earlier unattainable painful experience.
Dr Elizabeth F.Loftus is distinguished professor at the University of California, Irvine and a leading authority on false memory. She holds positions in the Departments of Psychology and Social Behavior & Criminology, Law and Society. She also holds appointments in the Department of Cognitive Sciences and the Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory. She has devoted much research effort to the possibility that recovered memories may be false—false memories that in some cases are due to therapeutic treatments designed to help patients dredge up memory. She has done scores of studies that show not only that memory can be distorted by suggestive influences but also that entirely false memories can be planted in people’s minds. She has succeeded in planting false memories of getting lost for an extended time as a child in a now famous experiment called ‘lost in the shopping mall’.
Lost in a Shopping Mall
Most of the experimental research on memory distortion has involved deliberate attempts to change memory for an event that actually was experienced. An important issue is whether it is possible to implant an entire false memory for something that never happened. Several years ago a method was conceived for exploring this issue to see whether people could be led to believe that they had been lost in a shopping mall as a child even if they had not been. ( Loftus & Ketcham). In one of the first cases of successful implantation (Loftus & Coan,), a 14 year old boy named Chris was supplied with descriptions of three true events that supposedly happened in Chris's childhood involving Chris's mother and older brother Jim. Jim also helped construct one false event. Chris was instructed to write about all four events every day for five days, offering any facts or descriptions he could remember about each event. If he could not recall any additional details he was instructed to write "I don't remember".
The false memory was introduced in a short paragraph. It reminded Chris that he was five at the time, that Chris was lost at the University City shopping mall in Spokane, Washington where the family often went shopping. That Chris was crying heavily when he was rescued by an elderly man and reunited with his family.
Over the first five days, Chris remembered more and more about getting lost. He remembered that the man who rescued him was "really cool." He remembered being scared that he would never see his family again. He remembered his mother scolding him.
A few weeks later Chris was interviewed. He rated his memories on a scale from l (being not clear at all) to ll (being very, very clear). For the three true memories, Chris gave ratings of 1, 10, and 5. For the false shopping mall memory, he assigned his second-highest rating: 8. When asked to describe his getting lost memory, Chris provided rich details about the toy store where he got lost and his thoughts at the time. He remembered the man who rescued him as wearing a blue flannel shirt, kind of old, kind of bald on top.... "and, he had glasses."
Chris was soon told that one of the memories was false. He selected one of the real memories. When told that the memory of being lost was the false one, he had trouble believing it.
Nearly two decades of research on memory distortion leaves no doubt that memory can be altered via suggestion. People can be led to remember their past in different ways, and they even can be led to remember entire events that never actually happened to them. When these sorts of distortions occur, people are sometimes confident in their distorted or false memories, and often go on to describe the pseudo memories in substantial detail. These findings shed light on cases in which false memories are fervently held- as in when people remember things that are biologically or geographically impossible. The findings do not, however, give us the ability to reliably distinguish between real and false memories.
‘People’s memories are not only the sum of all that they have done, but there is more to them: The memories are also the sum of what they have thought, what they have been told, what they believe. Who we are may be shaped by our memories, but our memories are shaped by who we are and what we have been led to believe. We seem to reinvent our memories, and in doing so, we become the person of our own imagination’.
Dr Elizabeth F. Loftus (Quote)
The idea of repression of early traumatic memories is a concept that many psychotherapists readily accept. In fact, it has been said that repression is the foundation on which psychoanalysis rests. According to the theory, something happens that is so shocking that the mind grabs hold of the memory and pushes it underground, into some inaccessible corner of the unconscious. There it sleeps for years, or even decades, or even forever–isolated from the rest of mental life. Then, one day, it may rise up and emerge into consciousness. Numerous clinical examples fitting this model can be readily found. Many of these examples involve memory of childhood trauma, such as sexual abuse, that allegedly has been repressed for decades until recovered in therapy. Rieker and Carmen (1986) described a woman who entered psychotherapy for sexual dysfunction and recovered memories of incest committed by her father. Schuker (1979) described a woman who entered psychotherapy for chronic insomnia, low self-esteem, and other problems and recovered memories of her father sexually assaulting her. M. Williams (1987) described a man who entered therapy for depression and sleep disturbances and recovered memories of a servant molesting him. These reports represent the clinical evidence that clients do indeed manage later to remember some earlier unattainable painful experience.
Dr Elizabeth F.Loftus is distinguished professor at the University of California, Irvine and a leading authority on false memory. She holds positions in the Departments of Psychology and Social Behavior & Criminology, Law and Society. She also holds appointments in the Department of Cognitive Sciences and the Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory. She has devoted much research effort to the possibility that recovered memories may be false—false memories that in some cases are due to therapeutic treatments designed to help patients dredge up memory. She has done scores of studies that show not only that memory can be distorted by suggestive influences but also that entirely false memories can be planted in people’s minds. She has succeeded in planting false memories of getting lost for an extended time as a child in a now famous experiment called ‘lost in the shopping mall’.
Lost in a Shopping Mall
Most of the experimental research on memory distortion has involved deliberate attempts to change memory for an event that actually was experienced. An important issue is whether it is possible to implant an entire false memory for something that never happened. Several years ago a method was conceived for exploring this issue to see whether people could be led to believe that they had been lost in a shopping mall as a child even if they had not been. ( Loftus & Ketcham). In one of the first cases of successful implantation (Loftus & Coan,), a 14 year old boy named Chris was supplied with descriptions of three true events that supposedly happened in Chris's childhood involving Chris's mother and older brother Jim. Jim also helped construct one false event. Chris was instructed to write about all four events every day for five days, offering any facts or descriptions he could remember about each event. If he could not recall any additional details he was instructed to write "I don't remember".
The false memory was introduced in a short paragraph. It reminded Chris that he was five at the time, that Chris was lost at the University City shopping mall in Spokane, Washington where the family often went shopping. That Chris was crying heavily when he was rescued by an elderly man and reunited with his family.
Over the first five days, Chris remembered more and more about getting lost. He remembered that the man who rescued him was "really cool." He remembered being scared that he would never see his family again. He remembered his mother scolding him.
A few weeks later Chris was interviewed. He rated his memories on a scale from l (being not clear at all) to ll (being very, very clear). For the three true memories, Chris gave ratings of 1, 10, and 5. For the false shopping mall memory, he assigned his second-highest rating: 8. When asked to describe his getting lost memory, Chris provided rich details about the toy store where he got lost and his thoughts at the time. He remembered the man who rescued him as wearing a blue flannel shirt, kind of old, kind of bald on top.... "and, he had glasses."
Chris was soon told that one of the memories was false. He selected one of the real memories. When told that the memory of being lost was the false one, he had trouble believing it.
Nearly two decades of research on memory distortion leaves no doubt that memory can be altered via suggestion. People can be led to remember their past in different ways, and they even can be led to remember entire events that never actually happened to them. When these sorts of distortions occur, people are sometimes confident in their distorted or false memories, and often go on to describe the pseudo memories in substantial detail. These findings shed light on cases in which false memories are fervently held- as in when people remember things that are biologically or geographically impossible. The findings do not, however, give us the ability to reliably distinguish between real and false memories.
‘People’s memories are not only the sum of all that they have done, but there is more to them: The memories are also the sum of what they have thought, what they have been told, what they believe. Who we are may be shaped by our memories, but our memories are shaped by who we are and what we have been led to believe. We seem to reinvent our memories, and in doing so, we become the person of our own imagination’.
Dr Elizabeth F. Loftus (Quote)
Saturday, 15 August 2009
What is the difference that makes the difference?
Why do some people seem to excel in life and others do not? Why do some people, against all the odds, still come out on top? Is it that they are just lucky? Do they have a guardian angel? Are they always in the right place at the right time?
How can it be, on the one hand, we have the likes of Professor Stephen Hawking who has excelled in his role at Cambridge University as a theoretical physicist, a position previously held by Sir Issac Newton, despite being severely disabled by motor neuron disease. On the other hand we have someone like Amy Winehouse who is a young, healthy, gifted singer songwriter with a potentially bright future ahead of her, but finds it so hard to deal with real life and is intent on destroying herself.
So what is the difference that makes the difference?
People who succeed do not have fewer problems than people who fail
The difference is the way in which we communicate with ourselves & the actions we take
It is not what happens to us that separates failure from success, it is how we perceive it & what we do about it.
Simone
How can it be, on the one hand, we have the likes of Professor Stephen Hawking who has excelled in his role at Cambridge University as a theoretical physicist, a position previously held by Sir Issac Newton, despite being severely disabled by motor neuron disease. On the other hand we have someone like Amy Winehouse who is a young, healthy, gifted singer songwriter with a potentially bright future ahead of her, but finds it so hard to deal with real life and is intent on destroying herself.
So what is the difference that makes the difference?
People who succeed do not have fewer problems than people who fail
The difference is the way in which we communicate with ourselves & the actions we take
It is not what happens to us that separates failure from success, it is how we perceive it & what we do about it.
Simone
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