Feel Safe and Money is Less Important! Hypnotic Suggestions of Safety Decrease Brain Responses to Monetary Rewards in a Risk Game

Abstract

When a stimulus is important, the corresponding brain responses increase, especially the P300 brain response. This is true for all kinds of important stimuli, also monetary rewards. In our study, we developed a hypnotic suggestion to reduce the subjective importance of monetary rewards. As successful suggestions do not contain negations, we suggested participants to feel safe during hypnosis instead of suggesting that money is not important anymore. We predicted lower P300 amplitudes when participants feel safe during hypnosis. We tested 24 highly suggestible participants playing a risk game in two conditions with monetary rewards while we measured their EEG brain responses. In the safety condition, we induced a hypnotic state and suggested that participants feel safe. In the control condition, participants played the risk game without hypnosis. Here we show that participants felt significantly safer in the safety condition and showed significantly lower P300 amplitudes to monetary rewards. Risk behavior did not differ significantly between conditions. Our results are important for substance use disorders, as decreased P300 responses to substance-related stimuli are associated with less craving and better abstinence. Therefore, we conclude that suggestions to feel safe during hypnosis might work as a treatment for individuals with substance use disorders.

Shared cognitive mechanisms of hypnotizability with executive functioning and information salience

“…Moreover, such dissociation has been theorized to manifest as dissociated connectivity between the ACC and PFC 77 , and recent evidence indicates a positive correlation between ACC-PFC connectivity and hypnotizability outside the context of hypnosis 6 . As some studies found no difference between hypnosis and non-hypnosis performance on more complex executive functions tasks of problem-solving and risk evaluation 78 , it is important to consider the possibility that frontal functions within- and outside hypnosis are not so different. Although our findings are not likely to represent dissociated connectivity between the ACC and PFC, they might represent altered recruitment of the PFC, outside hypnosis, in terms of reduced critical evaluative processing.…”

Hypnotic suggestions of safety reduce neuronal signals of delay discounting

“…For our study, we invited participants with suggestibility scores of at least 8 out of 12 (M = 8.6, range 8–11), indicating high suggestibility. Participants were paid according to the outcomes in the delayed gratification game and in a risk game that are described elsewhere 37 . The average payment that was paid out immediately was 23.5 Euro (SD = 0.2 Euro).…”

“…The experimenter observed the participants via two cameras: the first showing the participants in full view and the second showing the participants’ faces in close up. Participants played the delayed gratification task after a risk game that is reported elsewhere 37 , in both a hypnosis condition and a control condition, the order of which was counter-balanced across participants. In the hypnosis condition, the experimenter conducted a hypnosis induction according to the Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale 41 .…”

Safety on demand: Post‐hypnotic suggestions of safety reduce neural signals of reward sensitivity with long‐term beneficial effects

“…In our lab, we developed an intervention using hypnosis to make participants feel safe. Our intervention effectively increased the subjective feeling of safety both in the EEG laboratory (Schmidt, Hoffmann, et al, 2020; Schmidt & Holroyd, 2021) and in highly stressful clinical settings such as the intensive care unit (Schmidt et al, 2021; Schmidt, Deffner, et al, 2020). In these studies, we suggested participants to feel safe using the mental image of a safe place.…”