Pain and Suffering in Ischemia

Pain and dissociation in the cold pressor test: A study of hypnotic analgesia with "hidden reports" through automatic key pressing and automatic talking.

“…In the case of eight subjects who most clearly sensed a distinction between the usual report of pain in analgesia and that revealed through the automatic methods, all reported that the recollected pain had been felt as a sensory or intellectual experience, and it caused no distress or suffering. This is coherent with the results mentioned above for some pilot subjects in an ischemia experiment, although it is at odds with aspects of the findings of Knox et al (1974). It may very well prove to be the case that hypnotic analgesia relieves suffering more than it relieves sensory pain, but this cannot be considered proven.…”

“…In the present experiment, all of those with the clearest account of a difference between their absent pain and their recovered pain through the automatic methods reported that there was strongly felt sensory pain but a minimum of suffering. This result might be taken as established, except for the previous findings from our laboratory that under some conditions, although neither pain nor suffering were reported in the usual conditions of hypnotic analgesia, both pain and suffering were reported by the automatic talking procedure (Knox et al, 1974). This uncertainty about the pain-suffering dimension does not reflect, however, on either the demonstration that both pain and suffering are relieved through hypnotic suggestion or that there is processing of the information at some concealed level.…”

“…Some subsequent pilot subjects in ischemia, in which the pain and suffering reports were obtained retrospectively (i.e., after the amnesia was broken when the painful stress had already been terminated), have reported essentially normal pain with an absence of suffering. The painsuffering differentiation is therefore somewhat uncertain, and this report adds a few data relative to that distinctions This study differs from that of Knox et al (1974) by using the pain of circulating ice water (cold pressor test) as the source of laboratory pain, and by using automatic key pressing (the equivalent of automatic writing) as a means of regularly breaking the amnesia while the subject is also giving a verbal report, followed by retrospective reports when the amnesic barrier has been broken by automatic talking!…”

"Hidden observer" phenomenon in hypnosis: An experimental creation?

“…If, as it appears, the situational demands were not comparable for the two groups, no conclusion can be drawn about the behavior of the MA group from the be-havior of the LA group. All that can be said is that subjects in the MA condition furnished pain ratings that are numerically similar to those furnished in previous published reports (Knox et al, 1974;Hilgard et al, 1975;Hilgard et al, 1978).…”

The hidden observer as an experimental creation.

“…At the last (60 sec) reporting interval, seven of the eight more aware subjects (87%) reported higher hidden than overt pain. This, of course, is identical to the proportion of subjects in the Knox et al (1974) study that showed a hidden observer pain effect. The subjects tested by Spanos and Hewitt and Knox et al appear to have been somewhat higher in hypnotic susceptibility than those tested in the Hilgard studies.…”