A Brief History of Conversational Hypnosis

A Brief History of Conversational Hypnosis

It is important to know the history of conversational hypnosis because it came about over the course of over 100 years. Several people contributed to the vast amount of knowledge that has now become conversational hypnosis. It is important to point out that not one doctor or psychologist came up with the idea of conversational hypnosis. Rather, it was a sort of evolution that was created by many over the years.

The first major scientist to contribute to the fascinating topic of conversational hypnosis was Ivan Pavlov. Pavlov was perhaps most well known for the term “conditioning.” Pavlov taught dogs to associate food with the ringing of a bell. The dogs would salivate when given the food. Overtime, Pavlov exposed the dogs to the food and would ring a bell at the same time. When the food was taken away and only the bell was rung, the dogs still salivated. With conditioning, Ivan Pavlov paved the way for conversational hypnosis.

The next scientist to contribute to conversational hypnosis was Dr. John B. Watson. Watson was a behavioral scientist. He was well known for taking the basic principles that Pavlov had established and applying them to humans. Watson studied people, their behavior and how their behavior was influenced by their environment. Conversational hypnosis has a lot to do with behavior and Watson was able to influence the evolution of conversational hypnosis.

B.F. Skinner was another behavioral scientist who contributed to conversational hypnosis. We live in a stimulus response world and B.F. Skinner realized that. He realized that if you have a certain stimulus in the environment then it would illicit a response. He took what Dr. Watson had done and really took it to the next level. Skinner developed what is known as “radical behavioralism” which included thinking, perception and emotion in studying behavior of humans.

Milton Erickson was one of the first to be an advocate of medical hypnosis. He also was a major contributor of Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) which is a major component to conversational hypnosis. Erickson believed in the power of suggestion and that your subconscious mind is always active, the basis of hypnosis.

Lastly, Richard Bandler and John Grinder were the co-founders of Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP). NLP is the description of different communication techniques used to interact with people. NLP also deals heavily on the idea of persuasion.

All of these people and their research has led up to the idea and techniques of conversational hypnosis. Conversational hypnosis is the idea that you can persuade, manipulate, or control to get what you want. Of course, conversational hypnosis should only be used for good.