History of Hypnosis

In 18th century, Franz Anton Mesmer (1734-1815), a German physician and astrologist, who discovered what he called animal magnetism. The evolution of Mesmer's ideas and practices led Scottish surgeon James Braid to develop hypnosis in 1842.

The modern therapeutic hypnosis was represented by a Scottish physician and surgeon James Braid (1842) who described "hypnotism" as a state of physical relaxation ("nervous sleep") accompanied and induced by mental concentration. Braid was an important and influential pioneer of hypnosis and hypnotherapy. It is from his influential work that others derived the term "hypnosis" in the 1880s.

What qualified acceptance of hypnosis in medicine that we have today is significantly due to the efforts of pioneers in the experimental study of hypnosis, starting in the 1920's and 30's. The early researchers were Clark Hull and Milton Erickson.

Hull's 1933 made the efforts on the discussion of scientific research into hypnosis (Hypnosis and Suggestibility) and made important contributions in learning theory. While Erickson stressed the complex subjective inner processes operating in hypnosis, rather than the measurable correlates and standardized procedures promoted by Hull.

Milton H. Erickson (1901-1980) is generally considered to be the most important hypnotherapist. He was a psychiatrist, hypnotherapist practising in Arizona, Phoenix, USA. Milton Erickson died in 1980, but left a lasting legacy to the worlds of psychology, psychiatry, psychotherapy, hypnotherapy, pedagogic and communications.