Towards a multi-brain framework for hypnosis: a review of quantitative methods.

Most real-world applications of hypnosis involve a pair of actors: a hypnotist and a subject. Accordingly, most current models of hypnosis acknowledge the relevance of social factors in the development of the hypnotic response. Yet, psychophysiological research on hypnosis has been mostly restricted to techniques that are studying one individual, neglecting the complexity of hypnosis as a social phenomenon. In this paper, we review evidence suggesting that a multi-brain approach to studying the psychophysiology of hypnosis could lead to a breakthrough in our understanding of the neural correlates of hypnosis. In particular, we aim to highlight how this approach which relies on the information conveyed by complex verbal stimuli can be utilized to deal with the multifaceted nature of hypnosis. Furthermore, we present analytical approaches to assessing brain-to-brain coupling developed in the field of social cognitive neuroscience in the past decade, to aid the design of similar multi-brain studies in hypnosis research.