The Fourth Kind: A movie portrayal of the usefulness of hypnosis

Consciousness has always captivated my attention and has been the subject of my interest. I have decided to pursue an issue that the media never seems to depict properly. Hypnosis is best defined as the connection between two or more people, “In this interaction the hypnotist attempts to influence the subject's perceptions, feelings, thinking and behaviours by asking them to concentrate on ideas and images that may evoke the intended effects.”(Heap et al.(2001, p.3) Hypnosis has been a topic of great controversy in psychology and some even doubt its effectiveness. Being hypnotized occurs when a pattern a person’s subconscious is attained by simply getting them to focus on an object, regulate their thoughts and sometimes their breathing. The specific type of hypnosis that I will be covering is hypnosis that leads the patient to recall events that have taken place in past years. Hypnotist use memory recall hypnosis when the patient is dealing with issues from their past that they fail to remember consciously. Memory recall hypnotism has also been used in court cases helping witnesses or victims recall events related to the crime. One would conclude that such phenomenon would be considered as accurate if its trusted in serious court cases, but according to The International Library of Psychology: Hypnosis, it is considered inaccurate. Michael Heap and Irving Kirsch describe the accuracy of hypnosis for memory recall as a recollection of true memories and planted memories by the hypnotist stating “When hypnosis is used for recall of meaningful past events there is often new information reported. This may include accurate information as well as confabulations and pseudomemories. These pseudomemories may be the result of hypnosis transforming the subjects’ prior beliefs into thoughts or fantasies that the