The Independence of Suggestibility, Placebo Response, and Hypnotizability

Abstract

Suggestibility has been an important concept in the history of psychology and psychiatry. In addition to being equated with gullibility and persuasibility (Abraham, 1962), the concept of suggestibility has been central to the historical development of hypnosis (Weitzenhoffer, 1953), has been used to explain the placebo response in psychopharmacology (Trouton, 1957), and has been employed as a measure of personality characteristics, particularly neuroticism (Cattell, 1957; Eysenck, 1947). This review evaluates contemporary attempts to classify different types of suggestibility, and the relationship between suggestibility, hypnotizability, and the placebo response.