Brain activation during hypnotic suggestion of changes in pain sensation

This webinar will review the contributions of brain imaging to our understanding of hypnosis with a special focus on pain experience, teach practitioners about the efficacy of hypnosis in reducing pain experience, and alert researchers to the potential different underlying mechanisms of hypnotic efficacy.

Dr Stuart Derbyshire, National University of Singapore, Associate Professor Psychology Department, will discuss and explore this subject as well as the substantial control of chronic pain with hypnosis will be revealed as largely dependent upon changes in brain activity generally associated with pain sensation and affect. In contrast, control of acute pain with hypnosis will be revealed as largely dependent upon changes in brain activity generally associated with cognition. These findings imply different underlying mechanisms of pain control in patients and volunteers that would not have been apparent from behavioural pain reports.

CPD applied.

This webinar will help you:

• To understand the application of brain imaging in investigations of hypnosis.
• Be able to design a simple experimental intervention using hypnosis.
• To understand how brain imaging and behavioural findings can provide complementary insights into the mechanisms of hypnosis.

This webinar is organised jointly by the RSM Hypnosis and Psychosomatic Medicine Section, the RSM Pain Medicine Section, and is in association with the British Society of Clinical & Academic Hypnosis (BSCAH).