Preliminary study of relationships between hypnotic susceptibility and personality disorder functioning styles in healthy volunteers and personality disorder patients

BACKGROUND Hypnotic susceptibility is one of the stable characteristics of individuals, but not closely related to the personality traits such as those measured by the five-factor model in the general population. Whether it is related to the personality disorder functioning styles remains unanswered. METHODS In 77 patients with personality disorders and 154 healthy volunteers, we administered the Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale: Form C (SHSSC) and the Parker Personality Measure (PERM) tests. RESULTS Patients with personality disorders showed higher passing rates on SHSSC Dream and Posthypnotic Amnesia items. No significant correlation was found in healthy volunteers. In the patients however, SHSSC Taste hallucination (β=0.26) and Anosmia to Ammonia (β=-0.23) were significantly correlated with the PERM Borderline style; SHSSC Posthypnotic Amnesia was correlated with the PERM Schizoid style (β=0.25) but negatively the PERM Narcissistic style (β=-0.23). CONCLUSIONS Our results provide limited evidence that could help to understand the abnormal cognitions in personality disorders, such as their hallucination and memory distortions.