In the spring of 1960 a college student demonstrated hypnosis for purposes of entertainment. He first attempted to hypnotize Mrs. A., a young married woman with several children. Mrs. A. declared repeatedly that he could not hypnotize her and that she was “not smart enough” to be hypnotized. The student, after two unsuccessful attempts on Mrs. A., tried another member of the group, succeeded, and demonstrated elaborately the phenomenon of regression. As he did this, he explained mistakenly that he would have to be careful to remember every step of the procedure, since otherwise his subject might remain permanently in a state of childhood. Later Mrs. A. gave an account of this occurrence to her friend Mrs. B. Several months later Mrs. B´s young son underwent hypnosis satisfactorily during dental work. In discussing hypnosis, the dentist stressed that it should be used only in the field of one´s competence, it should not be used as a means of entertainment, and it was seriously wrong to “toy” with it.

Another three months passed uneventfully, and then Mrs. A. developed a sudden, severe “nervous breakdown,” requiring extensive psychiatric aid. This breakdown was not
regarded as very remarkable, since Mrs. A. was known to have a most traumatic history. She had lost her mother at an early age, had been reared in various foster homes, some of which had rejected her, had always felt rejected and unloved, and she had a long history of unpredictable temper tantrums. She also felt that she had never had any happiness until after her marriage.

About a month after Mrs. A´s illness Mrs. B, in sympathetic wonderment about the nature of mental illness, recalled some lay discussion of Mrs. A´s symptoms. As she reviewed this, she became impressed by a similarity between the patient´s helpless psychotic behavior and delusional statements, quite characteristic of an acute catatonic schizophrenic episode, and her own memories of Mrs. A´s account of the hypnotic regression at that parlor entertainment. She reasoned that Mrs. B, despite her assertions to the contrary at the time of the occurrence, had been inadvertently hypnotized and regressed simultaneously with the other subject and that this effect in some way had lain dormant, only to appear unexpectedly as a “nervous breakdown” many months later.

She was convinced that she was on the trail of vital information pertinent to Mrs. A´s recovery, but fortunately and wisely she consulted the dentist who had used hypnosis on her son and who had emphasized that it was “seriously wrong to toy” with hypnosis or to use it for entertainment. The dentist, avowing his lack of competence in psychiatry, referred the matter to this writer for psychiatric evaluation.

This is another instance demonstrating that good intentions, based upon a lack of knowledge could have led to harm for all concerned, had not the dentist been sufficiently well-informed to be able to interrupt the growing body of misinformation and misunderstandings deriving from Mrs. B´s assiduous, earnest efforts to be helpful. From those misunderstandings, though they were based upon an uninformed effort to be of service, irreparable harm could have come to the three families involved in that parlor
trick, unwarranted blame could have been heaped upon that student, and the use of scientific hypnosis by reputable professional men could have been made questionable in
the eyes of the public.

It is sufficient misfortune that the patient has a long traumatic history and a recognizable psychosis without obscuring these matters by misinterpretations. It is most desirable that her condition be understood by her relatives and by her community in the best possible psychiatric terms and not in the terms of uninformed, misleading post hoc thinking, so destructive to scientific knowledge.