A bit about the Elman hypnosis induction adapted to groups. In response to a query regarding a group-based adaptation of the Dave Elman Inductoin, in the Hypnotic Advancements email list, someone wrote:

I think we have an expert in the hub for Group Elman inductions, there is a guy in Taipei lurking in this hub and posting once in a while 😀 Dr. Phillips, We know you are here somewhere! You have the word.

Isn’t there an expression "speak of the Devil"? 🙂

While I certainly have ideas on how to handle the Group Elman, there are plenty of other folks with valuable insights as well.

As to group Elman, there are several adaptations of Elman’s basic approach which work wonderfully with groups. Elman is pretty much the basic approach I would use for individuals or groups. In all honesty, I believe it works better for individuals than with groups but then again I believe any one-on-one approach is superior to group work. With an individual, you can watch the feedback loop and see how the subject is responding and change approaches appropriately while for a group you pretty much have to shoot for the middle ground and hope you’re getting most folks to respond the way you wish. You maximize your success with certain strategies over others but there will always be a few individuals who just don’t respond to a group or cookie-cutter induction. What works with some folks just won’t work with a few who might respond better to another approach but you won’t be able to tailor your patter to those individuals in a group or recorded session as you are unable to give them the individual attention they need.

That said, the Elman still works well as a group induction. Some folks will use it as their primary patter for demonstrational or entertainment hypnosis as well. For stage hypnosis, it’s a fast induction which works fairly reliably with a lot of folks that appears to be part of your general relaxation or testing process and so you can then use some instant and rapid effects with folks in a showy way later that are actually deppening convincers and the like but appear to be instant inductions.

Some folks will add some other elements to the Elman for groups such as eye fixation and the like but it is not necessary. If you look at my DRTRC files the Fractionation Relaxation Conditioning File is actually based upon a Group Elman approach. The long Primary Conditioning File incorporates the Elman as well as four other induction processes used as deepeners. This is NOT the only way to do Group Elman, it is merely how I did it at that time for that recording set. There are many ways to do this. A recorded induction is basically a group induction that has been processed for no feedback at all from the audience of listeners (in live group events you can still use a very small amount of feedback to modify your approach but it is based upon group rather than individual responses and so while it may be useful to the group, it may not be as effective for a particular individual while an individual session would be based wholy upon the feedback responses and could be very effective for that individual due to the customization and tailoring of the approach).

You can do either a partial run or the full process with a few modifications from the one-on-one basic approach to make it more appropriate to groups. The problematic parts for most folks are 1. the eye catalepsy, 2. the eye opening and closing fractionation, 3. counting deepener, 4. the arm drop, and 5. the numbers going away.

For the eye catalepsy where you tell the person to imagine their eyes getting heavier and heavier until they just won’t work, etc., simply run it as in the original script and you will be fine. Just make sure you are timing it to catch most folks. Give them a signpost to relax the eyes to the point that they just won’t work and then when they are ready to test them and make sure they are relaxed to that point where they are so relaxed they just won’t work and then when they have tested them to just let go, to stop testing, and relax even deeper with every breath in and every deep breath out feeling themselves relaxing even deeper. Signpost carefully so they follow the instructions and aren’t testing for too long or they may test themselves right out of trance. In a one-to-one session you would watch for the eyelid movement or brow changes or REM and other indicators but in a group you can’t so keep the instructions specific.

The fractionation section of the induction can also be run "as-is" from the individual approach. It can work wonderfully. Of course, you will run across the odd individual who find the fractionation to be disconcerting and counter productive (this is particularly true of individuals who are already highly responsive and want to get on with the main event type suggestions). As it is a group induction though, you will find most folks respond quite well to it. If you find difficulties in that section, then note your timing as that can be crucial. Don’t leave folks with their eyes open for too long and also don’t lightening close them. It needs to feel like a natural beat of three-two-one eyes closed. With practice on the individual induction, a sense of pacing will come naturally that is easily transferred into the Group Elman.

When asking folks to go deeper as you count the numbers, we would normally pace to breathing so that the number or trigger word comes on an exhalation, becoming slower and on every other breath with deepening. With the group, you can’t really watch the breathing as easily. For me, I prefer the numbers to go downward for deepening (down = depth) while others go the other way. Don’t fret about the breathing, you can’t control everyone. You can hedge your bets by giving the rider suggestion that with each deep breath out the subject continues to go deeper. You can also phrase your counting something like "with each number you go deeper, with each breath out, going down down deeper down, breathe in, breathe out, four, deeper down, breathe in, breathe out, three, let go, all the way down, ten times deeper" etc.

For most groups, you won’t be able to do the arm drop test unless it’s a farily small group with spacing and room for you to run around lifting and dropping everyone’s arms. However, in such cases, you will most likely be running your Group Elman more like a parallel set of individual Elmans as you will then be able to utilize the feedback loop a bit better and watch each individual. Instead, for larger groups, just give the deepener suggestion that they notice how heavey loose limp and relaxed the arm has become. You can give additional suggestions for tests but most folks do not at this point. You can do another form of catalepsy test here by suggesting that the arm is so heavy that no matter how hard they try they cannot lift it but this may fail with a few folks without individual work and suggestions so it can be risky. Albeit, a number of stage hypnotists will use this as a test to remove folks who do lift their arms. Personally, I often put in the balloon test here instead so that they notice their arms getting lighter and lighter and I can visually note whose arms go up and how they respond to that. Most folks I know who do group inductions that are Elman based will simply tell the subjects to notice how heavy loose and relaxed they feel as they melt down deeper down and sink into the chair or couch.

The number amnesia is the hardest for most folks to do with a Group Elman . . . for good reason. It is unreliable to have all those folks counting and the racket can cause a number of folks to lose focus. Instead, many folks who teach the group Elman will suggest that you tell the subject to "imagine as I count the numbers, they begin floating away and fading, until by the time I reach such and such a number they have floated away from your memory" and then count and do some mix ups to skip some numbers before giving the suggestion "and push them all away now." This is the most problematic of the steps of the Group Elman as the number amnesia is one of the crucial tests of the individual Elman and it seems to be relegated to happenstance by most group effects. However, this is the most reliable way to control the response. You can still run it close to the original by telling the subjects to count silently to themselves and push the numbers away as each breath relaxes them further and further. This stays true to the spirit and intent of the original but it is not reliably observable with a group situation.

In any case, I hope this has been helpful. You can find a copy of David Fonteneau’s version of the Group Elman for Stage Hypnosis posted to the Hypnosis Technique Exchange (Dave is my co-moderator for that group). You will note that his approach to Group Elman is a bit more streamlined than my own.

All the best,
Brian