Is hypnotic responding the strategic

According to the ‘cold control theory’ of Dienes and Perner (2007) hypnotic responding is intimately linked to metacognition. Specifically, we proposed that what makes a hypnotic response hypnotic is the intentional performance of a (physical or mental) action while having inaccurate higher order thoughts to the effect that one was not intending the action. That is, the essence of hypnosis is a strategic lack of metacognition. In this chapter, I explore this idea in three ways. First, I argue that individual differences in first-order abilities, e.g. ability to attend to the world or inhibit information, are unrelated to hypnotisability; however, the tendency to be aware of one's mental states while performing a simple task is related to hypnotisability. Second, I argue that impairing the brain region involved in metacognition (specifically the brain region involved in maintaining accurate higher order thoughts) enhances hypnotisability. Third, I argue that hypnotised subjects have no abilities they don't have any way; the essence of hypnosis is not the existence of any first-order abilities but the fact one's actions feel involuntary. Overcoming pain seems a counterexample, but debatably, the only quality that hypnosis adds to one's ability to overcome pain is the feeling that the pain goes away by itself.