Hypnosis and the Law

• Author: Graham F. Wagstaff
• Published date: 01 October 2008
• Date: 01 October 2008
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0093854808321669
• Subject Matter: Articles

HYPNOSIS AND THE LAW

Examining the Stereotypes

GRAHAM F. WAGSTAFF

University of Liverpool, United Kingdom

The traditional view of the hypnotized person as someone in a state of automatism, possessed of transcendent powers, is

still popular among the general public. This has obvious implications for legal issues concerning possible coercion through

hypnosis and the use of hypnosis for interviewing witnesses. However,it is now the opinion of most researchers that hypno-

sis does not induce a state of automatism, and caution should be exercised when employing hypnotic procedures to facilitate

memory. It is concluded that better progress will be made in countering public misconceptions about hypnosis, and in benefiting

from research on the applications of hypnotic interviewing procedures, if more effort is made to use concepts and terminology

that relate hypnotic phenomena to everyday behavior and experience.

Keywords: hypnosis; memory; forensic interviewing; hypnotic coercion

Alarge volume of research from countries including Britain, Germany, the United

States, and Australia indicates that a popular image of a hypnotic participant is still

that of a person in a “trance state,” possessed of unusual powers, under the control of the

hypnotist, with little awareness of what is going on (Daglish & Wright, 1991; Green, Page,

Rasekhy, Johnson, & Bernhardt, 2006; Johnson & Hauck, 1999; McConkey & Jupp, 1986;

Wagstaff & Dockar, 1985; Wilson, Greene, & Loftus, 1986). If there is any truth in such

stereotypes, it is perhaps not surprising that the paths of hypnosis and law have crossed so

often. For example, if hypnotized individuals are under the control of the hypnotist and are

unaware of what is happening to them, then presumably they can be made to offend against

their wills or become unwitting victims of crime and abuse. Also, if they are not in control

of their actions, maybe people can be induced to tell the truth with hypnosis. Another pop-

ular stereotype of hypnosis is that it can be used to contact the unconscious mind and

uncover hidden memories. If this is so, then hypnosis obviously has potential for helping

witnesses recover important material during police investigations. But how accurate are

these views? To address this question, it is useful first to look briefly at some general

theoretical issues in modern hypnosis.

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CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND BEHAVIOR, Vol. 35 No. 10, October 2008 1277-1294

DOI: 10.1177/0093854808321669

© 2008 International Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Please direct correspondence to Professor G. F. Wagstaff, School of Psychology,

University of Liverpool, Eleanor Rathbone Building, Bedford Street South, Liverpool, UK L69 7ZA; phone:

0151 794 2949; fax: 0151 794 2945; e-mail: gwf@Liverpool.ac.uk.

THE STATE VERSUS NONSTATE DEBATE

Although hypnosis has traditionally been construed as an altered state or trance, this con-

ception of hypnosis has long been a source of controversy (Barber, 1969; Barber, Spanos,

& Chaves, 1974; British Psychological Society, 2001; Heap, Oakley, & Brown, 2004;

Kirsch & Lynn, 1995; Sheehan & Perry, 1976; Wagstaff, 1981, 2004). Modern supporters

of the “state” school continue to argue that central to the concept of hypnosis are alterations

in the participant’s psychological and/or physiological state or condition (see, for example,

Bowers, 1983; Gruzelier, 2000; Hilgard, 1986, 1991; Killeen & Nash, 2003; Woody &

Bowers, 1994; Woody & Farvolden, 1998). However, although supporters of the sociocog-

nitive or cognitive behavioral view also acknowledge that alterations in subjective experi-

ences are core phenomena in the study of hypnosis, they reject the traditional notion of

hypnosis as an altered state as misleading. Instead, the latter contend that various hypnotic

phenomena, including changes in subjective experience, are best described and explained

in terms of interactions between more mundane psychological processes, such as imagina-

tion, relaxation, role enactment, compliance, conformity, attention, attitudes, and expectan-

cies (see, for example, Coe & Sarbin, 1991; Kirsch, 1991; Lynn, 1992; Lynn & Rhue,

1991a; Spanos, 1991; Spanos & Chaves, 1989; Wagstaff, 1981, 1991, 2004). From this per-

spective, a hypnotized person is not someone who has fallen into a special altered psycho-

logical or physiological state but someone who is actively thinking and imagining along

with, and responding to, suggestions and instructions delivered in a context defined as hyp-

nosis. One result of debate on this issue is that terms such as “state” and “trance” tend to

be less popular in definitions of hypnosis than they used to be; for example, although dis-

cussed, the concept of hypnosis as a state is not actually central to the definitions of hyp-

nosis put forward by the American Psychological Association (1994; Green, Barabasz,

Barrett, & Montgomery, 2005) or the British Psychological Society (2001). Instead, it has

become more common to refer to hypnosis not as a special state or condition but as a pro-

cedure or set of procedures. For example, hypnosis can be described as a set of procedures

in which an individual receives (more or less any) instructions or suggestions to imagine

and think about certain ideas, set in a context defined or labeled as hypnosis.

However, although the issue of whether hypnosis is best construed as an altered state

remains unresolved, research in this area has done much to dispel the myth of the hypnotic

participant as a passive automaton possessed of transcendent powers. For instance, a vari-

ety of evidence indicates that hypnotic participants tend to be active cognizing agents rather

than passive responders, that much hypnotic behavior is comparatively easy to simulate,

and that suitably instructed and motivated nonhypnotic control groups can equal and some-

times surpass the hypnotic groups on a variety of performance measures including cogni-

tive capacities, feats of strength and endurance, and pain tolerance (see, for example,

Barber, 1969; Barber et al., 1974; Lynn & Rhue, 1991a; Spanos, 1991, 1992; Spanos &

Chaves, 1989; Wagstaff, 1981, 2004). Moreover, a variety of research has indicated that

participants’ descriptions of the experience of being hypnotized are indistinguishable from

those of participants who have undergone, for example, relaxation training or instructions

in the use of imagery (Barber et al., 1974; Kirsch, Mobayed, Council, & Kenny, 1992).

Nevertheless, although the research evidence and the opinions of many researchers and the-

orists in the academic community appear to run counter to many of the traditional stereo-

types of hypnosis, these stereotypes clearly persist in the public mind. Why?

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