In this study, participants who failed to exhibit pendulum movement in response to Chevreul's Pendulum (CP) instructions had lower Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale, Form A (SHSS:A) scores and reported experiencing less subjective response to hypnosis than did their counterparts who exhibited CP movement. However, intensity scores on Shor's Personal Experiences Questionnaire (PEQ) did not differ between pass- and fail-CP groups. Additionally, pass-CP participants showed positive correlations between PEQ intensity scores and hypnotizability scores, while fail-CP participants showed negative correlations among these measures. These findings are consistent with the notion that CP failure may reflect a situation-specific unwillingness to become imaginatively involved rather than a general inability to do so. Additional analyses revealed that 5 of 10 participants who had failed the CP task scored 0 or 1 on the SHSS:A, while only 3 of 65 pass-CP participants scored 0 or 1.

Int J Clin Exp Hypn. 2008 Jan;56(1):83-98.

Karlin RA, Hill A, Messer S.

Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA.

John G. Watkins PhD, Professor Emeritus of the University of Montana, is world renowned as a pioneering psychologist, particularly in the areas of hypnosis, dissociation, and multiple personality. He was a founder and past president of ISCEH, an international society in hypnosis. He has been the president of the Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis (SCEH), of the American Board of Psychological Hypnosis, and of the Hypnosis Division of the American Psychological Association. Dr. Watkins has also served as clinical editor of the International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis. He has lectured all over the world and authored many groundbreaking books and articles on hypnosis and psychotherapy, making him one of the leading theorists in the field.

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