Hypnotic age regression: a critical review.

W H , IEN GIVEN THE SUGGESTION that he is 5 months old, the hypnotized person at times indulges in infantile acts such as thumbsucking, babbling, crawling, bed-wetting, and feeding from a bottle. Pertinent to on-going research in the behavioral and physiological sciences are reports indicating that during such "hypnotic age regression" subjects manifest (1) some infantile reflex responses and (2) some overt behavioral responses that are not within the range of knowledge of infant or child behavior available, under normal conditions, to the adult. An example of the first is the apparent reinstatement of the "infantile plantar reflex" under hypnotic regression to an age of 5 months;' ' 63 an example of the latter is the recall by subjects under hypnotic regression to age 4, of the exact day of the week on which their fourth birthday fell. To form an estimate as to the validity and possible significance of such reported effects of "hypnotic age-regres-