For the record: a commentary on the role of suggestion in hypnosis.

In a recent article on the nature of hypnosis, Evans (2000) lists my name with that of Clark L. Hull as one of two past influential authorities on the subject who have allegedly taken (Weitzenhoffer, 1953) the position that hypnosis is just a form of suggestibility, presumably implying it is nothing more than that. Evans points out this is an oversimplification and adds that recent authorities agree hypnosis is a more complex phenomenon. I appreciate Evans giving me this much recognition, but I do wish he had been more accurate regarding my position on the matter. Not only I did not take such a position in 1953, but I made the point hypnosis was, indeed, a more complex phenomenon (Weitzenhoffer, 1953, page 252-259, 257). And, inasmuch as Evans mentions his belief that dissociation must be taken into account as a factor, I would add that in 1953, long before E.R. Hilgard came up with his dissociation hypothesis, I clearly hypothesized (pp.253ff) that when hypnosis is present some form of dissociation is involved along with the increase in suggestibility. Of course Pierre Janet (1889) had anticipated both of us in this regard by many years. Evans is not the only one to have misrepresented my original views on hypnosis. Over the years quite a few other writers have done the same and I feel that maybe it is time, while I can still do it, to correct this false impression. The matter is somewhat of a puzzle. Where have readers of my 1953 work gotten the idea that I once considered, and presumably still consider, hypnosis to be nothing more than a state of suggestibility? Was it the title of the book: Hypnotism: An Objective Study in Suggestibility? It seems to have been for some. It should not have been. In 1953 the term “hypnotism” and “hypnosis” were still understood to denote distinct objects of thought. Hypnosis was a state of being differing from the normal waking state. Hypnotism was the production, study and use of hypnotic phenomena. My choice of title was simply intended to indicate that my topic was what hypnotism then denoted and that, for the most part, the subject matter appeared to boil down mostly to the effects of suggestion rather than those of hypnosis, the state. It did not occur to me that anyone would interpret the title as saying that hypnosis, the state, was being reduced to being merely and only a state of suggestibility. But hopefully, Evans as well as others who have understood me to say hypnosis was just suggestibility, must have done more than look at the title of the book. So American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis 44:2, October 2001 Copyright 2001 by the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis