‘GAME OF HYPNOSIS’ OR ‘COMEDY OF ERRORS’?
Hypnosis, Compliance and Belief – Graham F Wagstaff
If you’ve read a lot of our blog, you’ll be very aware that most books about hypnosis are silly, sensationalist rubbish; and particularly those from decades ago. Not so, when it comes to Hypnosis, Compliance and Belief! While not being the easiest of books to absorb – Wagstaff doesn’t mince his words or waste page space, meaning you really (and I mean, really) have to concentrate – it is, however, one of the best books you’ll ever read on hypnosis.
I say that for a few reasons. First up is that rather than just accept the results of the standardised hypnotic scales – the SHSS:C, the HGSHS:A, the BSS, the CURSS, etc – that the responses to suggestion fall on a bell curve with 10% being highly responsive, 10% being minimally responsive, and everyone else falling somewhere in the middle, Wagstaff reviews masses of evidence that the vast majority of responding is simply, wait for it, COMPLIANCE!
Now, this isn’t the sort of thing you want to hear as a hypnotist, regardless of which side of the state or psychiatric debate you find yourself sitting on. Surely there has to be more to hypnosis than people just playing along? Well, yes, there is – and that’s where the magic and intrigue lie – but the rest of it, the majority of it, is very much a cultural phenomenal, sown in the expectations (rather than expectancies) of the hypnotists and participants alike.
This will require some unpacking; I am entirely aware of how ridiculous this sounds. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), the vast majority of hypnotic responses can be achieved, with the same feelings of automaticity and involuntariness, without an induction or the semblance of a hypnotic state. (That we “know”, check out our explanation of hypnosis and suggestion for more details.) What is more incredible, is that the same can be achieved with simple demands and requests, as long as they are framed within an experimental context.
Put your hand in this tank with the poisonous snake. Throw acid in the face of the assistant. Electrocute this person if they can’t guess the word you’re thinking of. Act like a massive ‘See You Next Tuesday’ because you’re wearing a prison warden’s outfit to people wearing a prisoner’s outfit. These are all behaviours requested within an experimental context that people have carried out. We have no list of the things people wouldn’t do – because of the lack of pre-registered trials, back when ethics didn’t seem to get a look in – so we can’t make sweeping statements about the nuances of which activities people would engage in, but we can say they definitely did these, AND THAT NO HYPNOSIS OR SUGGESTION WAS REQUIRED.
Phew. This is a heavy post for Cosmic Pancakes! Even by our standards, this is challenging. It turns out that people will just do things because they want to help the experimenter discover the thing they think they want to discover; or because they want to please (or appease themselves of) the person in authority. And none of this requires any amount of mind control; well, not the mind control that we care about here.
Wagstaff gets to these facts by looking at studies where scientists asked people why they did the things they did, and where they conducted experiments to specifically separate out what the participants would do as a result of suggestion, and what they’d do anyway. It turns out that most of the responses to suggestion are simply the results of compliance, although not necessarily entirely conscious compliance. The point is that they will (mostly) just do what is asked, regardless of any amount of control or lack of volition.
The second reason I say this is one of the best books you’ll ever read is because it leaves bare the remainder of the responses. Even if most of the behaviour is down to compliance, the very fact that a small amount is not is one of the most interesting things about this book. Apart from essentially questioning what our hypnotic scales are claiming of course. The bits that are left, the bits that are unexplained by simple compliance, are the bits that matter – from a scientific perspective, obviously. Perhaps therapists don’t care why people get better, and could live with the fact that suggestion had little impact on it, but scientists really do, particularly about that small part that remains.
Wagstaff has no answer to this question. Why do people respond, if not because they are complying? Why do those responses (and indeed, the compliant responses) feel automatic and involuntary? These are not the topics that Wagstaff engages in this book; but these are the topics that stand out to me as the most important questions to answer. We have to accept that participants fail to report honestly and accurately, and that they fail to achieve the levels of introspection that we’d prefer; but even Wagstaff, who is strongly committed to the notion of compliance in suggestion, has to accept that some of it IS LITERALLY REAL.
So, where most hypnotists (and particularly those happily believing in state or psychiatric determinants of response) will find this a difficult read, full of destruction and the wilful use of science to thwart magical thinking, the remainder of us can rejoice in the gap that Wagstaff leaves – the gap that still needs explaining; the gap that is the truly and honestly felt, classic suggestion effect.
The final reason why this is such a great book, is that it completely and utterly destroys state. These days that’s not such a biggy, but back in 1981, that was a real and ferocious fight. Nowadays, the fight is whether the naturally highly responsive participants have some psychiatric disposition (or weird brain) that the rest of us don’t have, and my prediction is that there will be another book, another Wagstaff, on the horizon showing how utterly ridiculous that suggestion is. Your brain scanning machines are simply not that great, unfortunately.
While we wait for the definitive destruction of the current incarnation of the biological vs psychological battle, read this book, before you read anything else. And don’t sweat the weight, nor worry for its depth, just carry on through to the single paragraph conclusion. It is definitely worth your time and money.
