The benefits of hypnotic analgesia as an adjunct to childbirth education were studied in 60 nulliparous women. Subjects were divided into high and low hypnotic susceptibility groups before receiving 6 sessions of childbirth education and skill mastery using an ischemic pain task. Half of the Ss in each group received a hypnotic induction at the beginning of each session; the remaining control Ss received relaxation and breathing exercises typically used in childbirth education. Both hypnotic Ss and highly susceptible Ss reported reduced pain. Hypnotically prepared births had shorter Stage 1 labors, less medication, higher Apgar scores, and more frequent spontaneous deliveries than control Ss' births. Highly susceptible, hypnotically treated women had lower depression scores after birth than women in the other 3 groups. We propose that repeated skill mastery facilitated the effectiveness of hypnosis in our study.

A case study is reported in which systematic desensitization techniques were used for treatment of stuttering. Following Brutten and Shoemaker’s (1967) hypothesis that stuttering behavior is a learned disorder predicated upon speech anxieties, desensitization procedures were successfully employed in substantially decreasing this behavior. Limitations to the study are outlined, and suggestions are made regarding further research.

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21 rats were tested in a shuttle box in which crossing terminated distinctive cues. Experimental Ss which had previously been exposed to these same cues paired with frustrative nonreward crossed significantly more times than controls. These results were interpreted as supporting the position that stimuli associated with frustrative nonreward may come to elicit a learned drive of conditioned frustration.