HYPNOTISM. 361 



were hypnotised into the deeper (sonmambulistic) stage ; 

 at the age of fourteen years the percentage was 55, at thirty 

 years 22, at forty years 10. The Nancy experimenters have 

 also found, what unbelieving man had before doubted, that 

 males and females are equally susceptible. 



Methods of production of hypnosis may be divided into 

 those which act by sensory stimulation, and those which act 

 by direct suggestion of the state. 



The sensory stimulation by which hypnosis is produced 

 may be either sudden and intense, or continuous and slight. 

 Thus some persons can be hypnotised by a sudden bright 

 light or loud sound. It is, however, somewhat doubtful 

 whether the condition so produced is a true hypnosis ; it 

 appears to be rather of the nature of a fright-paralysis, 

 closely allied to Preyer's fright-catalepsy in animals, and 

 the persons who can be so affected belong almost invariably 

 to the class of hystero-epileptics. 



The sensory stimulation, by which normal persons can 

 be hypnotised, must be of a quite different nature ; it may 

 act on any one of the senses, and of these it would appear 

 that the visual and tactile are most easily affected. Thus 

 a much used method is Braid's : the person is told to gaze 

 at some small object which may be bright and shining, e.g. 

 a sixpenny-piece, or dull, e.g. the end of a penholder or the 

 finger, and which may be held at any distance or level ; for 

 it is not necessary, as was once thought, to hold it a little 

 above the person's eyes, so that th^y are strained by the 

 effort of looking up. The so-called ^^ fixation method " is 

 merely a special case of the above. The " subject " is told 

 to look steadily at the hypnotiser's eyes. The tactile sense 

 may be stimulated in either of two ways, by direct contact 

 or by " passes." In the first, the hypnotiser gently strokes 

 some portion of the skin, e.g. forehead, with the hand ; in 



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