Glossary
Trance logic
Listen instead of reading · 35 minDirty Mind: Dirty Talk Hypnosis – Find Your Own WordsNo script, no borrowed lines: a trance that lets your own words out – in a lower, slower voice. In short
Trance logic means that people in hypnosis calmly accept contradictions that would bother them immediately when awake – similar to a dream.
What does it mean for you?
In a dream you are not surprised when the scene suddenly changes. Trance can feel similar: images and fantasies may simply be there without you having to check or judge them. Research no longer regards trance logic as a reliable marker of hypnosis.
What research says
Orne (1959) reported that hypnotized participants accepted such contradictions more often than simulators, and proposed trance logic as an essential feature of hypnosis.
Later studies found smaller and less consistent differences, so trance logic is no longer seen as a reliable marker of the hypnotic state.
Related topics
- Is hypnosis a special state – or expectation at work? The oldest debate in hypnosis research – state or expectation? With Orne's simulators, Hilgard's hidden observer and Kirsch's expectancy theory.
- Sexual fantasies: how common and normal are they? How common sexual fantasies are, what they are about and what they say about you – and what they do not. What research shows, in plain words.
Trances
Studies on this page
Glossary
- Demand characteristics Demand characteristics are the small cues in a situation that reveal what is expected of you – and that influence how you behave.
- Hypnosis Hypnosis is a state in which you turn your attention fully inward and engage with your imagination – so much that it feels real, like an arm growing heavy.
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