Hypnosis, Is It for You?

Few therapies in the history of medicine have enjoyed simultaneously such widespread acclaim and such universal condemnation as has hypnosis. To some extent these opposing attitudes still prevail. However, recent years have witnessed advances in experimental and therapeutic hypnosis which have tended to establish hypnotherapy firmly as a scientific treatment method. The present volume is a contribution to the growing literature on hypnosis. It issues out of experimental work with hypnosis in the treatment of various emotional difficulties, and it attempts to delineate the utilities and limitations, as well as advantages and disadvantages, of hypnotherapy. A considerable portion of Volume One is devoted to a step-by-step description of the induction process, illustrating various induction methods by excerpts from transcriptions of actual hypnotic sessions. There is a didactic discussion of the principles of psychotherapy, and of the psychopathologic factors in the different disease syndromes. Therapeutic methods applicable to the existing dynamics and the contributions hypnosis has to make to the treatment plan are also elaborated on in some detail.