Editing Suggestibility (section)

==Hypnosis==
{{main|Hypnotic susceptibility}}
Hypnotic suggestibility is an individual trait reflecting the general tendency to respond to hypnosis and hypnotic suggestions. Research with standardized measures of hypnotic suggestibility has demonstrated that there are substantial individual differences in this variable.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Milling LS | title = Is high hypnotic suggestibility necessary for successful hypnotic pain intervention? | journal = Current Pain and Headache Reports | volume = 12 | issue = 2 | pages = 98–102 | date = April 2008 | pmid = 18474188 | doi = 10.1007/s11916-008-0019-0 | s2cid = 32614443 }}</ref>

The extent to which a subject may or may not be "suggestible" has significant ramifications in the scientific research of [[hypnosis]] and its associated phenomena. Most hypnotherapists and academics in this field of research work from the premise that [[hypnotic susceptibility]] or {{nowrap|suggestibility{{hsp}}{{mdash}}}}{{hsp}}that is, the depth of hypnosis a given individual can achieve in a given context with a particular hypnotherapist and particular set of beliefs, expectations and {{nowrap|instructions{{hsp}}{{mdash}}}}{{hsp}}is a factor in inducing useful hypnotic states.

Dr. John Kappas (1925–2002) identified three different types of suggestibility in his lifetime that have improved hypnosis:

'''Emotional suggestibility''' – A suggestible behavior characterized by a high degree of responsiveness to inferred suggestions that affect emotions and restrict physical body responses; usually associated with hypnoidal depth. Thus the emotional suggestible learns more by inference than by direct, literal suggestions.

'''Physical suggestibility''' – A suggestible behavior characterized by a high degree of responsiveness to literal suggestions affecting the body, and restriction of emotional responses; usually associated with cataleptic stages or deeper.

'''Intellectual suggestibility''' – The type of hypnotic suggestibility in which a subject fears being controlled by the operator and is constantly trying to analyze, reject or rationalize everything the operator says. With this type of subject the operator must give logical explanations for every suggestion and must allow the subject to feel that he is doing the hypnotizing himself.

However, it is not clear or agreed what suggestibility (i.e., the factor on hypnosis) actually is. It is both the indisputable variable and the factor most difficult to measure or control.

What has not been agreed on is whether suggestibility is:
* a permanent fixed detail of character or personality;
* a genetic or chemical psychiatric tendency;
* a precursor to or symptom of an activation of such a tendency;
* a learned skill or acquired habit;
* synonymous with the function of learning;
* a neutral, unavoidable consequence of language acquisition and [[empathy]];
* a biased terminology provoking one to resist new externally introduced ideas or perspectives;
* a mutual [[symbiotic]] relation to the Other, such as the African conception of uBunthu or [[Ubuntu (philosophy)|Ubuntu]];
* related to the capacity of empathy and communication;
* a matter of concordant personal taste between speaker and hypnotist, and between listener and listener's like of, or use for, speaker's ideas;
* a skill or a flaw or something neutral and universal.

Conceptually, hypnotizability has always been defined as the increase in suggestibility produced by hypnosis. In practice, hypnotizability is measured as suggestibility following a hypnotic induction. The data indicates that these are different constructs. Although the induction of hypnosis increases suggestibility to a substantial degree, the correlation between hypnotic and non-hypnotic suggestibility approximates the reliability coefficients of so-called hypnotizability scales. This indicates that hypnotic susceptibility scales are better measures of waking suggestibility than they are of hypnotizability.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Kirsch I | title = Suggestibility or hypnosis: what do our scales really measure? | journal = The International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis | volume = 45 | issue = 3 | pages = 212–25 | date = July 1997 | pmid = 9204635 | doi = 10.1080/00207149708416124 }}</ref>

Existing research into the phenomena of hypnosis is extensive and randomized controlled trials predominantly support the efficacy and legitimacy of [[hypnotherapy]], but without a clearly defined concept of the entity or aspect being studied, the level an individual is objectively "suggestible" cannot be measured empirically, and makes exact therapeutic outcomes impossible to forecast.

Moreover, it logically hinders the development of non-bespoke hypnotherapy protocol. On this latter point, it must be pointed out that while some persuasion methods are more universally effective than others, the most reliably effective method with individuals is to personalize the approach by first examining clients' motivational, learning, behavioral, and emotional styles, among others. Indeed, few hypnotherapists will not make taking case history from the clients they will be working with priority.{{citation needed|date=December 2019}}

===Autonomy===
The intrigue of differences in individual suggestibility even crops up in the early Greek philosophers. [[Aristotle]] had an unconcerned approach:

{{blockquote|"The most intelligent minds are those that can entertain an idea without necessarily believing it."|Aristotle}}<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Rock|first=Hugh|date=July 2017|title=Social Theism: How can the Liberal Idea of God Speak to a Materialist Worldview?|journal=Modern Believing|volume=58|issue=3|pages=253–263|doi=10.3828/mb.2017.19|issn=1353-1425}}</ref>

This perhaps is a more accurate echo of the experience of practicing hypnotherapists and hypnotists. When anyone is absorbed in someone else's inspiring words as they outline an idea or way of thinking, the subjective attention is held because of the logic, the aesthetic, and the relevance of the words to one's own personal experience and motivations. In these natural [[trance]] states, like those orchestrated purposefully by a hypnotherapist, the 'critical faculties' are naturally less active when there is less to be naturally critical of.

It is perhaps the "necessarily believing it" part of the Aristotelian quote above that is problematic, as this conception of suggestibility raises issues pertaining to the autonomy of attributing belief to an introduced idea, and how this comes to take place.<ref>{{Cite book|date=2001-09-01|editor-last=Eisen|editor-first=Mitchell L.|editor2-last=Quas|editor2-first=Jodi A.|editor3-last=Goodman|editor3-first=Gail S.|title=Memory and Suggestibility in the Forensic Interview|doi=10.4324/9781410602251|isbn=9781410602251}}</ref>

===Susceptibility===

Popular media and layman's articles occasionally use the terms "suggestible" and "susceptible" interchangeably, with reference to the extent to which a given individual responds to incoming suggestions from another. The two terms are not [[synonym]]ous, however, as the latter term carries inherent negative bias absent from the neutral psychological factor described by "suggestibility".

In scientific research and academic literature on hypnosis and hypnotherapy, the term "suggestibility" describes a neutral psychological and possibly physiological state or phenomena. This is distinct from the culturally biased common parlance of the term "suggestible". The term "susceptible" implies weakness or some increased danger to which one is more likely to become a victim. It therefore has a negative effect on expectation and itself is a hypnotic suggestion that suggestions must be noticed and guarded against.  Both terms are often bound with undeserved negative social [[connotation]]s not inherent in the word meanings themselves.

To be suggestible is not to be gullible. The latter pertains to an empirical objective fact that can be shown accurate or inaccurate to any observer; the former term does not. To be open to suggestion has no bearing on the accuracy of any incoming suggestions, nor whether such an objective accuracy is possible, as is the case with metaphysical belief.

While research from the 1960s indicated increased suggestibility under the influence of [[LSD]] among both mentally ill and healthy individuals, recent documents suggest that the CIA and Department of Defense have discontinued research into LSD as a means of mind control.<ref>{{cite web |url= http://www.gulfweb.org/bigdoc/rockrep.cfm#hallucinogens |title=Is Military Research Hazardous to Veterans Health? Lessons Spanning Half A Century, part F. HALLUCINOGENS |publisher=103rd Congress, 2nd Session-S. Prt. 103-97; Staff Report prepared for the committee on veterans' affairs |date=December 8, 1994 |vauthors=Rockefeller IV JD |location=West Virginia |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060813164326/http://gulfweb.org/bigdoc/rockrep.cfm#hallucinogens |archive-date=August 13, 2006 |access-date=December 13, 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Middlefell R |title=The effects of LSD on body sway suggestibility in a group of hospital patients |journal=The British Journal of Psychiatry |volume=113 |issue=496 |pages=277–280 |date=March 1967 |pmid=6029626 |doi=10.1192/bjp.113.496.277 |s2cid=19439549 |url= http://www.lycaeum.org/research/researchpdfs/1489.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110430033215/http://www.lycaeum.org/research/researchpdfs/1489.pdf |archive-date=2011-04-30}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Sjoberg BM, Hollister LE |title=The effects of psychotomimetic drugs on primary suggestibility |journal=Psychopharmacologia |volume=8 |issue=4 |pages=251–262 |date=November 1965 |pmid=5885648 |doi=10.1007/BF00407857 |s2cid=15249061}}</ref>{{Primary source inline|date=June 2023}}

Some therapists may examine worries or objections to suggestibility before proceeding with therapy: this is because some believe there is a rational or learned deliberate will to hold a belief, even in the case of more convincing new ideas, when there is a compelling cognitive reason not to 'allow oneself' to be persuaded. Perhaps this can be seen in historical cases of mass hypnosis where also there has been media suppression. In the individual, unexamined actions are sometimes described by hypno- and psycho-therapists based on outgrown belief systems.

Hypnotic suggestions include terms, phrases, or whole concepts where to understand the concept includes making sense of a subjective sensation, or a framework for the appropriate response.... simple one-word forms of this include the word [[terrorism]] where to understand the concept, one must understand the notion of terror and then understand in the sentence that it is meant to refer to "that" given object.

===Language acquisition===

[[Cognition]] of a phrase must occur before the decision how to act next can occur: because the concepts must exist before the mind. Either they are suggested from the mind itself, or in response to introduced suggestions of concepts from outside – the world and its scenarios and facts, or suggestions from other people.

A suggestion may direct the thoughts to notice a new concept, focus on a specific area within the world, offer new perspectives that later may influence action-choices, offer triggers for automatic behavior (such as returning a smile), or indicate specific action types. In hypnotherapy the portrayed realistic experience of the client's requested outcome is suggested with flattery or urgency, as well as personalized to the client's own motivations, drives, and tastes.

===Common experience of suggestions===

Suggestions are not necessarily verbal, spoken, or read. A smile, a glare, a wink, a three-piece suit, a scientist's white coat, are all suggestive devices that imply more than the immediate action. A hypnotist uses techniques that use these instinctive "fillings-in of gaps" and changes to how we respond to a scenario or moment. In the therapy setting, a hypnotist or hypnotherapist will likely evaluate these automatic cognitive leaps, or [[dogma]], or any self-limiting or self-sabotaging beliefs.

Being under the influence of suggestion can be characterized as exhibiting behavioral compliance without private acceptance or belief.
That is, actions being inconsistent with one's own volition and belief system and natural unhindered action-motivations. This could hinder the autonomy, expression or [[self-determination]] of an individual. It could equally supersede emotions with rationally chosen, deliberate long-term results.

===Experimental vs. clinical===
The applications of hypnosis vary widely and investigation of responses to suggestion can be usefully separated into two non-exclusive broad divisions:
* '''Experimental hypnosis''': the study of "'''experimental suggestion'''", of the form:
::"What is it that my group of test subjects actually do when I deliver the precise standard suggestion ABC to each of them in the same experimental context?"
:: (i.e., given a fixed suggestion, what is the outcome?)

* '''Clinical hypnosis''': the study of '''clinical suggestion''' directed at the question:
::"What is it that I can possibly say to this particular subject, in this specific context, to generate my goal of having them do XYZ?" (I.e., given a fixed outcome, what is the suggestion?)