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spontaneously and is discouraged by certain schools, while others encourage it. Clearly the mechanism of
transference involves the stimulus of the therapist's presence activating a particular pattern of feeling and
behaviour in the patient, and is therefore a particular aspect of the above.
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Principles of Hypnosis (4). Other theories of hypnosis viewed from a systems perspective: they all provide partial insights
This section of theories may be summarised as follows. They all regard the primary system of discussion
not as the individual Subject, but as the larger system of Hypnotist plus Subject, or the even larger one of
the society within which the two individuals are a subsystem. Each theory tends to focus on one
particular aspect of such larger systems and to view it as the central aspect of Hypnosis.
The position taken in this book is that while all such aspects can be of importance in the field of
Hypnosis, none of them is either necessary or sufficient to the production of Hypnotic phenomena.
It should be clear, moreover, that the concept of an organic system which we have used as a foundation
for our subject can deal as naturally with systems consisting of two or more individuals as it can with two
or more subsystems of the human nervous system. This aspect of the subject will be developed in more
detail later, but here we may note that the basic element of Hypnosis, considered as an aspect of the
two-person system, is that of the activation of some particular process -- which we will label A - within
the repertoire of the Hypnotist, which leads to some required change (an increase or decrease) in the
activity of some corresponding process B in the Subject:
/A > |B.
A is typically a linguistic process, but may well have behavioural and affective components: i.e. the
Hypnotist is primarily talking, but the body language and the emotional tone in what is said will also
contribute.
The successive application of this form of interaction leads in time to the change in the pattern of the
mental and physical activities in the Subject which is aimed at by the Hypnotist.
6. Information.
A very recent theory of Rossi (1993)Bib discusses Hypnosis in terms of information. This theory may be
presented as follows. We have observed that there are many systems in the body. Where in this book we
are starting with the more elementary idea that each may alter the activity of another, an
information-theoretical approach says that each can communicate information to another. The effect of
the communication of information will, of course, be to alter the activity in some way.
In his own words Rossi proposes that, "The cybernetic (circular) flow of information between our
psycho-social world, mind and body down to the cellular-genetic level is the general domain of
Hypnotherapy."
However at its present stage of development the theory is biassed towards showing how changes at a
mental level may be communicated via a hypothesised process of "information transduction" to the
chemical processes involved in healing, and there is little development at the level of analysing Hypnotic
inductions, etc. The theory is also somewhat confused by its association with the rather limiting
conception that Hypnotherapeutic suggestion is "the entrainment and utilisation of psychological rhythms
generated by the cybernetic loops of mind-body communication" - the theory involving diurnal cycles
described above.
By contrast the approach of this book is to be in broad agreement about the domain of Hypnotherapy:
that it does involve the many cybernetic systems at the social, mental, physical and chemical levels. But
within this scheme it unifies existing understanding rather than positing any new specific principles. We
will also find that it makes far clearer the dynamics of the cybernetic processes, in many different
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Principles of Hypnosis (4). Other theories of hypnosis viewed from a systems perspective: they all provide partial insights
contexts.
Conclusion
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