A primer of psychology / by Edward Bradford Titchener.

  • Titchener, Edward Bradford, 1867-1927.
Date:
1899
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A primer of psychology / by Edward Bradford Titchener. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Double con sciousness. 276 Abnormal Psychology by physicians, with patients who are undergoing hypnotic treatment, to avoid interference in the case by other oper- ators. (2) We have seen that the subject who is aroused from the somnambulistic state has no memory of what has taken place during hypnosis. Oftentimes, however, memory is carried over from hypnosis to hypnosis; i.e., the subject, when rehypnotised, re- members what he saw and did in the previous state of somnambulism. We thus have an alternation of memories: waking memory, hypnosis, waking mem- ory continued, hypnotic memory continued, waking memory again, hypnotic memory again, and so on. This phenomenon has received the name of double consciousness, and has been explained by the hypo- thesis that there are two ‘ selves ’ to every body, a primary (waking) self and a secondary (trance) self. The hypothesis is unnecessary. When we wake, whether from somnambulism or dreaming, we wake into a different world from that in which we have been; the functions of the cortex are altered; there is no reason why we should remember from the one state to the other. When we fall asleep again, or are rehypnotised, we go back into the unreal world; the cortex takes on its former functions once more; there is no reason why we should not remember from the one state to the other. Everyone knows how easily dreams are forgotten on waking. And most readers have, probably, had the experi- ence of a continuous dream, a dream that is continued from night to night. The reason that dreams are not more often continuous is that there is no regulation of the dream con-