Subjects selected on the basis of being amnesic and experiencing their amnesia as "voluntary" or "involuntary" were subjected to two conditions designed to breach their amnesia: (1) lie detector, and (2) honesty instructions. A third group receiving relaxation instructions served as a control. Posthypnotic amnesia was breached under lie detection and honesty conditions. However, there appeared to be an interaction between how subjects reported their experience of amnesia (voluntary and involuntary) and the degree to which amnesia was breached. Voluntary subjects accounted for the majority of breaching. Implications for (1) studies on breaching (2) theories and processes of posthypnotic amnesia, and (3) studies in posthypnotic amnesia are discussed.

The study attempted to improve upon the procedures of an earlier experiment in isolating the effects of hypnosis, a personal relationship, and the knowledge of an experiment on influencing antisocial conduct. A measure of a subject's moral stance toward the specific antisocial act (selling heroin) was also obtained. The results suggest that the experimental manipulations were general!}' successful in deceiving subjects into believing that the antisocial request was separate from an experiment, and that a subject's moral stance toward the act may be an important variable in determining compliance with requests to engage in antisocial behavior. The major importance of the stud}', however, is believed to be the identification of methodological and ethical problems in research of this kind, and these arc considered in some detail.

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