Phenomenological state effects during hypnosis: a cross‐validation of findings

Abstract

AbstractFrom a factor analysis of Pekala's (1982, 1991b) Phenomenology of Consciousness Inventory completed retrospectively in reference to the Harvard scale induction, Kumar et al. (1996) obtained the following five correlated state effects factors: dissociated control state, positive affect, negative affect, visual imagery and attention to internal processes. They found that the factor‐based scores of dissociated control state, positive affect and attention to internal processes were significantly correlated with the Harvard scores. The present study found evidence for the cross‐validity of the factor weights (obtained in the previous study) in computing factor‐based scores in data from two separate studies. The same factors (as in the previous study) of dissociated control state, positive affect, and attention to internal processes were significantly correlated with hypnotizability not only as assessed by the Harvard, but also the Stanford scale. These findings fit well with the traditional conceptions of hypnosis and observations by clinicians and experimentalists that certain phenomenological states are reliably observed to occur under a hypnotic induction. Copyright © 1999 British Society of Experimental and Clinical Hypnosis