Biomedical subjects

Erik Z Woody

Publications and source records attributed to Erik Z Woody.

8 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Expect the unexpected: ability, attitude, and responsiveness to hypnosis.

Participants' expectancies and hypnotic performance throughout the course of a standardized, individually administered hypnotic protocol were analyzed with a structural equation model that integrated underlying ability, expectancy, and hypnotic response. The model examined expectancies and ability as simultaneous predictors of hypnotic responses as well as hypnotic responses as an influence on subsequent expectancies. Results of the proposed model, which fit very well, supported each of the 4 major hypothesized effects: Expectancies showed significant stability across the course of the hypnosis protocol; expectancies influenced subsequent hypnotic responses, controlling for latent ability; hypnotic responses, in turn, affected subsequent expectancies; and a latent trait underlay hypnotic responses, controlling for expectancies. Although expectancies had a significant effect on hypnotic responsiveness, there was an abundance of variance in hypnotic performance unexplained by the direct or indirect influence of expectation and compatible with the presence of an underlying cognitive ability.

Adult↗

PubMed2006

Does the more vivid imagery of high hypnotizables depend on greater cognitive effort? A test of dissociation and social-cognitive theories of hypnosis.

In an investigation of the role of cognitive effort in hypnotic responding, high and low hypnotizable participants produced emotionally neutral imagery in response to effortful versus effortless hypnotic suggestions. Heart-rate increase served as an objective index of cognitive effort, and subjective ratings of imagery vividness, absorption, effort, and control were collected. Compared to lows, high hypnotizable participants experienced their imagery as more vivid and absorbing, yet their heart rates indicated no higher level of cognitive effort than lows. Compared to effortless wording, effortful wording of suggestions increased cognitive effort in lows, as indexed by heart-rate increase, but had no effect on the effort expended by highs. Ratings of subjective control were strongly correlated with subjective effort for lows but unrelated for highs. These results support the dissociated-control theory of hypnosis rather than the dissociated-experience or social-cognitive theories.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Induction of compulsive-like washing by blocking the feeling of knowing: an experimental test of the security-motivation hypothesis of obsessive-compulsive disorder.

BACKGROUND: H. Szechtman and E. Woody (2004) hypothesized that obsessive-compulsive disorder results from a deficit in the feeling of knowing that normally terminates thoughts or actions elicited by security motivation. To test the plausibility of this proposed mechanism, an experiment was conducted to produce an analog of washing in obsessive-compulsive disorder by eliciting a scenario of potential harm and using hypnosis to block changes in internally generated feelings that would normally occur during washing. RESULTS: Participants reacted with increased disgust, anxiety, and heart rate to their mental images of contamination and potential danger. As predicted, high but not low hypnotizable participants showed a significant prolongation of washing when change in feelings during washing was blocked hypnotically. CONCLUSION: Results show that blocking the affective signal that is normally generated during security-related behaviors, such as washing, leads to prolonged performance of these behaviors. This finding lends support to the plausibility of the proposed model of obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Journal Article↗

PubMed2005

Multiple hypnotizabilities: differentiating the building blocks of hypnotic response.

Although hypnotizability can be conceptualized as involving component subskills, standard measures do not differentiate them from a more general unitary trait, partly because the measures include limited sets of dichotomous items. To overcome this, the authors applied full-information factor analysis, a sophisticated analytic approach for dichotomous items, to a large data set from 2 hypnotizability scales. This analysis yielded 4 subscales (Direct Motor, Motor Challenge, Perceptual-Cognitive, Posthypnotic Amnesia) that point to the building blocks of hypnotic response. The authors then used the subscales as simultaneous predictors of hypnotic responses in 4 experiments to distinguish the contribution of each component from general hypnotizability. This analysis raises interesting questions about how best to conceptualize and advance measurement of the ability to experience hypnosis.

Adult↗

PubMed2004

Hypnosis, memory, and frontal executive functioning.

According to the dissociated-control hypothesis forwarded by Woody and Bowers (1994), the effects of hypnosis are consistent with attenuated frontal lobe functioning. The present study was designed to compare the performance of participants with high and low hypnotic ability on a variety of memory tasks thought to be sensitive to frontal lobe functioning, as well as some control memory tasks not considered to be sensitive to such functioning. Results generally indicated that participants with high hypnotic ability have more difficulty with tasks sensitive to frontal lobe functioning, including free recall, proactive interference, and source amnesia tasks, both within and outside of the context of hypnosis. These differences, which were not found for nonfrontal tasks, are generally supportive of the dissociated control theory of hypnotic responding.

Cognition↗

PubMed2004

Four decades of group hypnosis scales: what does item-response theory tell us about what we've been measuring?

To overcome problems with previous psychometric approaches to hypnosis scales, the authors applied full-information factor analysis, based on multidimensional item-response theory (IRT), to a 39-year sample of 11,517 records of the Harvard Group Scale of Hypnotic Susceptibility, Form A (HGSHS:A). They also performed a comparable analysis on the standardization sample of the Waterloo-Stanford Group C Scale (WSGC). The HGSHS:A emerges as two-factored, whereas the WSGC more closely approaches unidimensionality. The HGSHS:A factor structure and means show very little change over 4 decades. However, IRT-based item analysis on the HGSHS:A indicates that problems such as "pseudoguessing" on 2 items limit the quality of the item set. The authors propose alternative substantive interpretations of the traits that may underlie the two-factor structure.

Female↗

PubMed2003

How can brain activity and hypnosis inform each other?

Applying P. Teitelbaum's conception of the method of physiological psychology as interlocking stages of analysis and synthesis, the authors examine how studies of brain function can advance the understanding of hypnosis as a psychological process. They consider the exploration of animal analogues of human hypnosis, the study of brain injury in humans as a window on mechanisms underlying hypnosis, the distinct questions that brain-imaging studies of hypnosis can address, and the potential for comparative and developmental approaches to hypnosis as close allies to psychophysiological approaches. They conclude both that hypnosis is a powerful technique for studying the brain mechanisms of conscious experience and that underlying brain mechanisms may shed new light on longstanding theoretical debates about hypnosis.

Animals↗

PubMed2003

What we don't know about the brain and hypnosis, but need to: a view from the Buckhorn Inn.

Based on reflections on the University of Tennessee Conference on Brain Imaging and Hypnosis, the authors point the field of hypnosis toward a new generation of research that can successfully coordinate multiple methods of inquiry and effectively connect psychological with biological understanding. They examine issues concerning hypnosis as a state, hypnotic susceptibility as a trait, and the psychological processes that underlie hypnotic responses. The article indicates ways in which some old questions can, and need to, be asked in new ways. The authors illustrate how to move toward a neuropsychological understanding of hypnosis by describing the classic suggestion effect and consider candidate psychological mechanisms to explain this effect. They argue that the neuroscience of hypnosis needs to build on a sound psychological foundation and add to, rather than replace, existing levels of analysis.

Brain↗