The American journal of clinical hypnosis
September 4, 2026
Chris E. Corlett, Jesse J. Norris, Sharika Majeti et al.
Mystical experiences or peak spiritual experiences have been shown to be of potential benefit in facilitating personal growth and ameliorating anxiety and depression. A pilot study demonstrated the feasibility of hypnotically induced mystical experiences. Althrough participants' qualitative experiences were recorded and analyzed, they have yet to be reported. Although participants' qualitative...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
September 2026
Cecilia Fabre
This article explores feminine leadership as a form of guidance rooted in inner coherence, intuition, symbolic awareness, and connection with spiritual and relational dimensions of experience. It contributes to the dialogue on leadership in psychotherapy and organizational contexts by proposing that Ericksonian hypnosis and symbolic awareness can inform a relational model of leadership aligned...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
November 1, 2025
Martaria Rizky Rinaldi, Gilles Van Luijtelaar, Nida Ul Hasanat et al.
Hypnosis, traditionally studied as a psychological phenomenon, is increasingly explored through electroencephalography (EEG) to monitor alterations in brain activity associated with the hypnotic state. This study provides a bibliometric analysis of EEG-based hypnosis research, mapping key trends, contributors, and emerging themes. A Scopus-based bibliometric analysis was conducted on January...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
February 5, 2025
Kaloyan S. Tanev, Carolyn Daitch
1 citation
Current evidence-based therapies considered efficacious for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) include Prolonged Exposure Therapy (PE), Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR), and medication treatments. Hypnosis, one of the first mind-body therapies known to Western medicine, has been used for mind-body problems such as conversion reactions,...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
October 1, 2021
Kathryn Lane Rossi
On the 19th of September 2020 Ernest Rossi, my husband, professional partner, and best friend of 30 years left this mortal world. His passing was a comparatively rapid process of dissipation extended over a period of approximately six days. In addition to the complex of emotions and physical responses, I experienced grief. This grief affected me more than any prior loss or sadness in my life as...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
October 1, 2020
Akira Otani
Hypnosis has long been successfully used in the treatment of trauma and related disorders. In this paper, I describe a hypnosis-informed approach to PTSD using mindfulness. The Mindfulness-Based Phase-Oriented Traumatic Therapy (MB-POTT) follows the phase-oriented tradition that was originally proposed by Pierre Janet, later expanded by Daniel Brown and Erika Fromm using clinical hypnosis....
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
July 1, 2018
Jon K Amundson, Marc W Ross, Debra Campbell
While much has been made of the value of Buddhist mindfulness in clinical treatment, little attention has been given over to its parallels, if not antecedents in Hindu philosophy. Buddhist traditions in the vipassana, ch'an and zen tradition, and the practices associated, find their roots in Advaita philosophy and practice. This article looks at the useful/effective nature of Advaita and its...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
October 1, 2016
Devin B. Terhune, Etzel Cardeña
53 citations
Although most definitions of hypnosis consider inductions as the initial stage in a hypnosis protocol, knowledge of inductions remains poor and uninformed by recent developments in theory and research. It is frequently argued that inductions play a critical role in hypnotic responding or, by contrast, are largely interchangeable and unimportant. Drawing on the literature on suggestibility,...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
2016
Ronald J Pekala
7 citations
Wickramasekera II (2015) has penned a comprehensive and thoughtful review article demonstrating how empathy is intimately involved in the psychology and neurophysiology of hypnosis and the self. Hypnosis is a very "mental" or subjective phenomenon for both the client and the research participant. To better assess the mind of the client/participant during hypnosis, it is my belief that we need...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
2016
Janna A Henning
In response to Wickramasekera II's description of his empathic involvement theory of hypnosis in "Mysteries of hypnosis and the self are revealed by the psychology and neuroscience of empathy" (Wickramasekera II, 2015), Henning offers further reflections on what empathy might be and what it allows therapists to do, particularly in conditions of hypnotic trance. She defines her intersubjective...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
July 1, 2010
Graham F. Wagstaff
21 citations
In the first of two recent papers, Pekala, Kumar, Maurer, Elliot-Carter, Moon and Mullen (2010a) review what they consider to be the relationships between trance or altered state effects, suggestibility, and expectancy, and how they relate to the concepts of hypnosis and hypnotism. They also suggest that these concepts can be assessed with an instrument they term the PCI-HAP (Phenomenology of...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
April 2010
Ronald J Pekala, V K Kumar, Ronald Maurer et al.
This study sought to determine if self-reported hypnotic depth (srHD) could be predicted from the variables of the Phenomenology of Consciousness Inventory - Hypnotic Assessment Procedure (PCI-HAP) (Pekala, 1995a, 1995b; Pekala & Kumar, 2007; Pekala et al., 2010), assessing several of the processes theorized by researchers to be associated with hypnotism: trance (altered state effects),...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
October 1, 2003
Akira Otani
In this article major ancient Buddhist meditation techniques, samatha, vipassana, Zen, and ton-len, will be described in reference to contemporary clinical hypnosis. In so doing, the Eastern healing framework out of which these techniques emerged is examined in comparison with and in contrast to its Western counterpart. A growing body of empirical literature shows that meditation and hypnosis...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
October 2002
Ernest L Rossi
This conceptual review explores some speculative associations between the neuroscience of expectancy and surprise during stress and therapeutic hypnosis. Current neuroscience is exploring how novel interactions between the organism and the environment initiate cascades of gene expression, protein synthesis, neurogenesis, and healing that operate via Darwinian principles of natural variation and...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
October 1, 1997
Ronald Maurer, V K Kumar, L Woodside et al.
46 citations
Participants (N = 206) experienced 15-min of monotonous drumming either before or after hypnosis (Harvard scale). Participants completed the Phenomenology of Consciousness Inventory (PCI) in reference to the last 4-min of drumming. Stimulus order did not affect the objective trance levels as measured by the Harvard scores. The subjective trance level as measured by hypnoidal scores (predicted...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
January 1996
V K Kumar, G Marcano, Ronald J Pekala
The present study replicated and extended Kirsch, Council, and Wickless's work evaluating the reliability and concurrent validity of a subjective response scale developed for the Harvard Group Scale of Hypnotic Susceptibility. Consistent with Kirsch et al.'s findings, the subjective counterpart of the Harvard scale demonstrated high reliability (coefficient .90) and concurrent validity (r = .84...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
October 1995
J Vanderlinden, P Spinhoven, W Vandereycken et al.
Hypnotizability, subjective experiences during hypnotizability assessment, and dissociation were studied in 53 eating disorder patients in order to explore the relationship between these phenomena. Dissociation was measured with a newly developed self-reporting Dissociation-Questionnaire (DIS-Q), level of hypnotizability was assessed with the Stanford Hypnotic Clinical Scale (SHCS), subjective...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
April 1995
Ronald J Pekala
Three clinical cases illustrating the use of a brief hypnotic-assessment procedure (HAP) utilizing the Phenomenology of Consciousness Inventory (PCI) (Pekala, 1982, 1991c) are presented. The PCI-HAP consists of a 20-minute induction procedure, a short debriefing interview, and completion of the PCI by the client after the session. The procedure allows for the assessment of a client's...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
April 1995
Ronald J Pekala
In the present study we assessed a short-form hypnotic-induction procedure for determining hypnotic susceptibility. Eighty-four subjects completed a short hypnotic-induction procedure and afterwards completed two self-report phenomenological state instruments (the Phenomenology of Consciousness Inventory, PCI, Pekala, 1982, 1991c and the Phenomenology of Consciousness Inventory: Short Form,...
The American journal of clinical hypnosis
July 1993
J M Holden, F MacHovec
A substantial number of people facing physical and/or psychological crisis report having a near-death experience (NDE) involving a subjectively real experience of an alternate reality. Where NDE content is associated with positive emotions, benefit might be gained by hypnotic recall of the NDE, yet such recall might involve possible risk in the form of reactivation of the original crisis. In...