Background

-This study concerns minimizing the risk of pseudomemory in the use of hypnosis
-Guidelines were set by the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis (ASCH) to help with the problem of biased recall due to hypnotic or nonhypnotic suggestions by suggesting that neutral expectations be created by the patient
-present study wanted to take guidelines further by adding a prehypnotic warning- warns participants that through hypnosis one has a tendency to create false memories

Method

Participants
-48 undergrads

Procedure
-divided into two pre-hypnotic information conditions
-requirement:  12 in each need to pass target noise hallucination suggestion

-all participants were briefed about 3 hypnosis myths, where first and third were identical, myths differed with second
-condition 1:  “warning condition”  basically the 2nd myth was about how hypnosis helps you remember things that you couldn’t otherwise
-condition 2:  “control condition”  2nd myth was that suggestions will work whether or not you want them to
-all participants selected a night from the previous week (following Orne’s nocturnal events paradigm)
-they were then age-regressed hypnotically and asked if they heard any loud noises; if so, to describe them
-initial inquiry:  participants awoke from hypnosis and asked about the night they remembered; were encouraged to remember the noise,  pseudomemory interview consisted of asking about the noise and whether or not it actually occurred; confidence
-pseudomemory:  scored as such if participants reported noise during interview and said noise really did occur
-hidden observer:  rehypnotized and given hidden observer instructions (part of the brain that really knows what’s going on), interviewed
-re-contacting the “hypnotized part”:  participants instructed to not remember their “hidden part”  (amnesia) and recontact their “hypnotized part”,  interviewed
-amnesia canceled:  canceled amnesia of “hidden part”, interviewed (4th time), awoke form hypnosis
-post-questions
-pseudomemory assessed (e.g. did noises actually occur, confidence)
Results

-major findings:  -significant effect  for prehypnotic warnings on suggestibility during
                          hypnosis
     -warning had no effect on posthypnotic pseudomemories on those who
     accepted the suggestion
     -therefore, prehypnotic warnings reduce suggestibility but not
     pseudomemories
     -because most did not change their answers when
       they were faced with changing instructions, concluded that it is difficult
     to reverse pseudomemories

Discussion

-do participants recognize the hypothesis of the experiment and answer accordingly
-postexperimental questions may be necessary   (are they responding to demand characteristics or do they truly believe what is being suggested)
-table 1 is interesting