From Dynamic Lesions to Brain Imaging of Behavioral Lesions: Alloying the Gold of Psychoanalysis with the Copper of Suggestion

Elucidating unconscious processing with instrumental hypnosis

Most researchers leverage bottom-up suppression to unlock the underlying mechanisms of unconscious processing. However, a top-down approach - for example via hypnotic suggestion - paves the road to experimental innovation and complementary data that afford new scientific insights concerning attention and the unconscious. Drawing from a reliable taxonomy that differentiates subliminal and preconscious processing, we outline how an experimental trajectory that champions top-down suppression techniques, such as those practiced in hypnosis, is uniquely poised to further contextualize and refine our scientific understanding of unconscious processing. Examining subliminal and preconscious methods, we demonstrate how instrumental hypnosis provides a reliable adjunct that supplements contemporary approaches. Specifically, we provide an integrative synthesis of the advantages and shortcomings that accompany a top-down approach to probe the unconscious mind. Our account provides a larger framework for complementing the results from core studies involving prevailing subliminal and preconscious techniques.

Relational hypnosis

This article provides a meta-theoretical framework, which can be applied to hypnosis, based on relational (intersubjective) psychoanalysis. The relationship between hypnosis and psychoanalysis is reviewed by describing three splits: (a) psychoanalysis split off from brain science; (b) psychoanalysis split off from hypnosis; and (c) splits within psychoanalysis itself. Reintegrations of these three splits are discussed from a meta-theoretical point of view--through neuropsychoanalysis and hypnodynamic hypnotherapy (or hypnoanalysis), which combines interpersonal and intrapersonal psychology. Evidence of the mutual adjustments of the hypnotist's style to the needs of the hypnotized is presented, including the unconscious interactional mechanisms that enable these adjustments in the context of relational hypnosis.