Brain scans of hypnotized people that are taken as they forget and are triggered to remember have revealed neural circuitry that is key to the memory suppression and recall process.
The researchers who conducted the study said their insights into the memory suppression and recall process may yield insight into the mechanisms underlying amnesia.
Yadin Dudai and colleagues published their findings in the January 10, 2008, issue of the journal Neuron, published by Cell Press.
In their experiments, the researchers identified two groups of volunteers—those who were susceptible to hypnotic suggestions and those who were not. They showed both groups a documentary depicting a day in the life of a young woman. A week later, they placed them in a magnetic resonance imaging scanner and induced them into a hypnotic state. In this state, the scientists gave the subjects a posthypnotic suggestion to forget the movie, also giving them a reversibility cue that would restore the memory.
Once the subjects had been brought out of the hypnotic state, the researchers tested their recall of the movie, then gave them the reversibility cue and tested their recall again. As expected, the hypnosis-susceptible group showed reduced recall of the movie, compared with the hypnosis-nonsusceptible group.
Analysis of the brain scans taken during posthypnotic amnesia and memory recovery revealed distinctive activity differences between the hypnosis-susceptible group and -nonsusceptible group in specific occipital, temporal, and prefrontal areas of the brain. The researchers also detected telltale brain activity changes in the hypnosis-susceptible group as they forgot and recalled memory of the movie. In that group, activity in some brain regions was suppressed during memory suppression, while activity in other regions increased. And during reversal of the posthypnotic suggestion, the susceptible group showed recovery of activity in suppressed regions.