Phenomenological Differences among Self Hypnosis, Mindfulness Meditation, and Imaging

Abstract

A survey of 122 subjects was conducted to investigate the differences in the phenomenological quality of the experiences engendered by three types of awareness discipline: self-hypnosis (21 subjects), waking dreaming (49 subjects) and mindfulness meditation (25 subjects from a 2-week retreat, and another group of twenty-seven subjects from a 2-day weekend retreat). A questionnaire, the Profile of Trance, Imaging, and Meditation Experience (TIME) was used in the survey Discriminant analyses were used to construct models of the differences in the phenomenological quality of the experiences among the three groups. A number of phenomenological dimensions, in the major areas of attention, thinking, memory, imagery, body sensations, emotions, time sense, reality sense, and sense of self, were found which could accurately distinguish among the experiences of practitioners of the three types of awareness training. Results show that while self hypnosis involves self-referential thinking, memory changes, and intense emotions, waking dreaming emphasizes the immediate impact of emerging images, which unfold in a thematic manner and have a sense of their own reality. Mindfulness meditators have difficulty managing distractions, but with experience learn greater awareness of bodily processes, and experience changes in the perception of time and self; mental processes seem to slow down, and awareness assumes an impersonal quality. No attributions as to the causes or sources of these phenomenological differences are made, as the survey was not large enough to provide comparison groups, subject matching, or other statistical controls necessary for causal analyses.