Hypnosis Focus Groups

Hypno-STEP is a new technique for predicting consumer reactions to prospective changes in brand strategy. It utilizes the 60 year-old time-tested STEP (STrategy Evaluation Program) technique described in Eric Marder’s book, combined with the ability of hypnosis to get respondents to “visualize” future brand and category scenarios.  

Hypnotized respondents in the focus group first indicate their current  brand purchase intentions. They do this by allocating a total of 10 “stickers” to one brand or to a combination of brands in the category.

Then, using the power of hypnosis  they are told to “visualize” a time in the future relative to the brands in the category.  Because hypnosis can create ”illusions,” respondents are easily able to do this (much like in a hypnosis stage show). Respondents are then exposed to your prospective brand strategy changes, such as a new positioning concept, a price change, new advertising, new packaging, a new product introduction, or any other new strategy variable.

After exposure to the brand’s prospective changes, respondents  again indicate their brand purchase intentions using the 10 “stickers.”  The focus group discussion  then centers on why respondents did or did not change their brand purchase intentions, based on their pre-to-post sticker allocations.

Because hypnosis enables respondents to “visualize” future category and brand scenarios, the Hypno-STEP technique provides more accurate and deeper feedback about the viability of the brand’s prospective strategy changes.

This new technique will enable us to access respondents' dreams about your product or service -- dreams that will point the way to innovative advertising, marketing and new product strategies. The technique is based on the scientific discovery called Hypnosis Induced Lucid Dreaming (H.I.L.D.)

What are dreams?

Our dreams are a collection of images, ideas, emotions, sensations and stories that occur when we sleep.The reason we dream is not fully understood, although this has been a topic of scientific, philosophical and religious interest throughout history. Dreams mainly occur during the REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep stage, when our eyes can actually be seen moving back and forth under our eyelids. The REM dream state is also confirmed by EEG and fMRI brain monitoring. When we dream we are actually hallucinating and see things that are not there. We have the illusion of moving though dream space. We can also hear, feel , smell or even taste in dreams. When we dream we can create stories that contain unusual and new associations between characters and elements within the stories. The vast majority of people cannot recall their dreams when they wake up.

Hypnosis and the REM state

 Hypnosis also creates a REM state in subjects and is therefor very similar to the REM dream state. The key difference between the hypnosis REM state and the dream REM state is that in hypnosis subjects can maintain contact with the external world whereas this is not possible in dreaming. Additionally, under hypnosis subjects can recall their dreams. And this is why the Hypno-Dream technique is a new valuable market research technique.

Why Hypno-Dream Research?

By accessing the content of someone's dreams we can discover their subconscious desires about your specific product or service. Sigmund Freud believed that dreams reflected a person's wish fulfillment - that if someone wanted something but did not get it in their conscious life, they could get it in their dreams. Freud believed that dreams were a way for the subconscious mind to present to us our secret desires. Dreams are about what is emotionally important to us. They contain our repressed emotions, memories, traumas, challenges of character, or events we are not ready to consciously acknowledge.

Hypnosis Induced Lucid Dreaming (H.I.L.D.)

The Hypno-Dream technique is based on the scientific discovery of Hypnosis Induced Lucid Dreaming (H.I.L.D.). "Lucid dreaming" is the ability to become aware during a dream that you are in fact, dreaming, and being able to exert control over what happens in the dream. Lucid dreamers can watch their dreams evolve and then alter their course as they see fit. It is like a virtual reality app or a movie that they can create. The occurrence of lucid dreaming has been scientifically verified in many fMRI research studies and everyone has the ability to become a lucid dreamer. The Hypno-Dream technique enables respondents to create "lucid dreams" incorporating specific products or services  we suggest to them while they are in the REM "H.I.L.D." state. 

The Hypno-Dream Technique

Once respondents in a focus group (or in an IDI project) have been hypnotized, and have entered the REM dream state, they are given an instruction to construct a dream incorporating the client's product or service. We allow 10 minutes for respondents to construct their dream (the average time for a REM dream). At the end of that time period we question the respondents about their dream and probe the elements connected to the client's product or service. The content from their dreams will be quite different from traditional focus group responses since it is hallucinatory and not bound by the laws of physics or logic. The goal is to discover new and unique insights into consumer needs and wants.

USING  THE "AUTOMATIC WRITING" TECHNIQUE IN HYPNOSIS FOCUS GROUPS

Automatic Writing is the process of writing without using the conscious mind. The technique is used  in Hypnosis Focus Groups to deep-dive for emotional content from respondents' subconscious minds. The technique is used in addition to direct questioning about their emotions relative to the topics in the discussion guide. With this technique respondents are told to visualize a blackboard and to write on it, using a visualized piece of chalk, the words or pictures that describe their emotional response  to the stimulus or questions given to them by the moderator. The stimulus might be to ask them to write their reactions to a brand name, or a particular word or phrase, or to complete a sentence. They are then asked to explain why they wrote the words or pictures, and further discussion then proceeds with the group. 

The advantage of Automatic Writing is that  the subconscious provides "instant" responses compared with the usual "lag" from respondents which is  typical in traditional groups where their conscious minds "filter" the answers to guard their emotions. The technique of Automatic Writing using hypnosis has been validated by many academic studies as an efficient way to explore the subconscious.

Automatic Writing was originally used in Spiritualism and the New Age movement as a method of "channeling" spirits, and was used in  séances by mediums . During the Surrealist Art movement, Automatic Writing was one of many ways artists used produce original works of art. It is also believed that many writers produced material that they would not have written by using only their conscious mind.

Edmund Gurney, Charles Richet, and William James, 19th century psychologists, are generally credited with first using Automatic Writing in the psychological field. Pierre Janet , a French psychologist , was a pioneer of Automatic Writing in the field of hypnoisis. Automatic writing has been used as a tool in Freudian psychoanalysis  where it is a way to get insight into the mind of the patient through their subconscious  word choices.

Today,  psychological clinicians use Automatic Writing to interact directly with the subconscious.  When using  Automatic Writing, patients have no conscious knowledge that writing is occurring . Such writing can aid the therapeutic process by allowing hidden  psychological material to be obtained. Additionally, the part of the brain that controls Automatic Writing is believed to have access to information that is  unavailable to the brain centers that control speech.  Automatic Writing can thereby uncover information not accessible through verbalization.

Automatic Writing in Hypnosis Focus Groups can be an exciting way to discover new and different emotional content from respondents.  A typical questioning process (with respondents eyes closed) would be as follows, using a cosmetic brand as the example:

Now I want you to visualize that there is a blackboard in front of you. And next to the blackboard is a piece of chalk. Now I want you to take the chalk and write on the blackboard,  using words and/or pictures,  to tell me how you feel when I say the  __________ cosmetic brand.

Then, each respondent, in turn,  is asked what they wrote and why they wrote that.  A series of “laddering” probes  are also used at this point to deep-dive further into the emotional content about the brand, and its foundational elements. At the end of that questioning process, respondents can comment about what they have heard from other members of the group.  The information from Automatic Writing Hypnosis Focus Group sessions has been used by many companies to better understand the emotional map of their brands.   

                                      THE HYPNO Q-SORT TECHNIQUE

Hypno Q-Sort is a powerful cost-effective technique to research a large number of brand positionings, ad concepts, new product ideas, package designs or other marketing plan elements in a single study, resulting in the discovery and quantification of distinct respondent segments. Results are easy to understand and are geared to making marketing decisions.  In the past, Q-Sort studies were conducted with “awake” respondents, but now the technique can be conducted with respondents who have first been hypnotized so the results are based on their subconscious evaluations, a more reliable measurement of how they feel.

The  Q-sort technique was developed  80 years ago by William Stephenson, a psychologist and Professor at the University of Missouri. The technique gets respondents  to rank-order stimulus material, such as product concept statements, within a given  context . For example, respondents  can be asked to rank-order 50 product concept statements on a scale of  "like best – like least ." Respondents also provide  verbatim reasons for their "top" and "bottom" ranked concepts. Additional information about demography and purchase behavior can also be included in the questionnaire.  Then, each respondent's ranking  is statistically correlated with every other respondent in the study. For example, with 100 respondents, you will  end up with 4,950 intercorrelations. (The  "correlation"  between two individuals who have rank-ordered the same data is  simply a measure of how closely they did the rankings, with +1.00 indicating an exact match in their  rankings, and -1.00 indicating they did their rankings exactly opposite of one another.)

The inter-correlations are then run through a factor analysis computer program  to find  the distinct groups (factors) of respondents  with high inter-correlations.  A “factor” can be thought of as a group of highly inter-correlated respondents. That is , if respondents 23, 78 , 83, 97 and 106 all had high inter-correlations, they would form the basis for inclusion in  “Factor 1.” . The computer program would then go through the process again to find "Factor 2" , made up of  another distinct group of respondents with high inter-correlations. (But not high inter-correlations with those respondents in Factor 1).  The process continues until all statistically significant factor-groups have been identified.  When the  factor analysis is completed,  you might end up with  4 or 5  "factors", or groups of respondents based on the similarity of their rankings.

Once the "factors", or groups of respondents,  have been identified, the next step is to analyze which product concepts they liked and why. This is done by evaluating the rank order of  the 50 product concepts for the respondents in each  factor, and analyzing the verbatim comments about why they liked their “top-ranked” concepts. Other analyses could examine the size of the group , the demography or product usage or brand preference of the factor group compared with the general population, or compared to the other factor groups.

The power of this technique is that a large number of concepts or other marketing plan elements can be researched in a single study, determine which concepts rise to the top, and calculate the size of the groups with the winning concepts. And, by using hypnotized respondents, their subconscious evaluations  will provide more reliable data than research using “awake” respondents. 

HYPNO-SYNECTICS BRAINSTORMING IN FOCUS GROUPS

BACKGROUND

Hypno-Synectics is a technique that can help marketers and planners do a better job of getting respondents to brainstorm in focus groups. It combines the 50-year old  brainstorming technique of Synectics (the original “outside-the-box” technique) with the scientific use of hypnosis.

The main problems in brainstorming are  (a)  getting respondents  to access their own knowledge bank, (b) using that knowledge in a  brainstorming process,  and then (c) "cajoling"  them to share the new ideas  with other respondents  in the group. Through the combination of hypnosis and the techniques of Synectics, these brainstorming  problems can be solved, and the brainstorming process can be enhanced. 

THE HYPNO-SYNECTICS PROCESS

 What is Synectics? The term Synectics comes from the Greek word synectikos which means  "bringing different things into a unified connection." The key brainstorming concept here is to get people in the focus group to focus on  seemingly disconnected words, images and concepts in order to  develop something new and original. The Synectics method  gets respondents  to use  non-rational thought processes   by "making the strange appear familiar," and by "making the familiar appear strange."  As an example, respondents  might be asked to  think about new ways to show a car in a TV.  commercial; but instead of the  traditional method of the camera following the  car along the road, they would be told to think about showing the car from the viewpoint of  a pebble in the road, or by a nail in the tire, or the chrome trim on the door. New ideas will come from this type of thinking.

Why use hypnosis? Hypnosis enables a respondent  to get in touch with their subconscious, where their knowledge bank memories and emotions are stored. The subconscious is like a hard drive containing information about everyone and everything they have ever come across in their lives. When people are in the “awake” state, it is extremely difficult for them to recall even a tiny part of their past experiences; but in hypnosis, through a process called “age regression” they can do this with ease. This is important since we want respondents  to be able to recall and share  their  past experiences as part of the brainstorming process.

Hypnosis also enables respondents  to suspend their “rational” side and more freely bring out absurd, crazy and weird ideas – ideas they might have withheld if they were awake for fear of sounding  strange, or because of peer pressure in the session.  These “crazy” ideas are often the launching pads for great practical ideas in the session.

The Moderator. The moderator in the Hypno-Synectics session  prepares the stimulus material for the brainstorming , in consultation with  the client. The stimulus material consists of the exercises and questions to be used to get the brainstorming session going and keep it on track, using the Synectics techniques The moderator conducts the hypnosis process for the group.

Respondents  for the session. There are usually  6  to 8 respondents  in each brainstorming session, usually chosen based on typical criteria such as demographics and  product and brand usage.

The hypnosis process. At the start of the session, the respondents  are hypnotized as a group. While in hypnosis, respondents  will be very relaxed and will be told that it is “ok” to provide any ideas that come to them from their subconscious mind.

The Initial brainstorming exercise. The first step in the session is to state and define the brainstorming subject.  Once the subject is defined , the initial exercise gathers information about it from the subconscious minds of the respondents . One key way to do this is to “age-regress”  the respondents  “back in time” to earlier events in their lives where they were involved in the subject of the brainstorming session. Each respondent  probably has had some experiences  relative to the subject,  and this information will be brought out. All of the experiences and ideas from this segment of the session will be written on large sheets of paper and pasted up on the walls of the room where the session is being held (all the ideas from the session are posted this way as well).  As ideas come out, respondents  will be encouraged to ‘hitchhike” on what they hear, and those ideas will also be written up too.  At the end of this segment, respondents  will now have a more complete understanding of the subject and will have come up with some initial  insights about it.

Additional Hypno-Synectics  techniques. At this point in the session, respondents  have been exposed to the subject in detail and have heard a good deal about experiences from the other respondents. They now have a base of information as a starting point. And, because they are in a state of hypnosis, they have been “trained” to share any ideas with the group, no matter how “crazy” they sound.

There are many different Hypno-Synectics brainstorming exercises  that can now be used, depending on the goal of the session. Some of the more common ones are described below.

Direct Analogies

 The “Direct Analogies”  exercise is  used  in Hypno-Synectics to  help respondents   break up their existing minds sets.  Here we tell respondents  to find some similarity  between things that are otherwise dissimilar.  For example,  Brunel, the inventor of underwater tunnels,  solved some of his construction problems  by watching and thinking about a shipworm tunnel into a timber. In the "direct analogy" you try to  find some parallel situation that is analogous to the one you are brainstorming about. As an example, Let’s assume we are brainstorming new ways to promote an American automobile brand. Here are some examples of  "Direct Analogy” questions that could be presented to the group:

• How is buying a car like sky diving
• How is buying a car like playing a game of solitaire
• How is buying a car like a hair dryer
• How is buying a car like seeing a kangaroo for the first time

After hearing everyone’s answers  to a particular  "Direct Analogy" question, respondents  would be told to hitchhike on the answers and come up with ideas about new motivators to get people to consider the auto brand.   As an example, a respondent  might say that "buying a car is like sky diving" because they always feel like they are "floating on air" when they get a new car. And, another respondent  might hitchhike and say, "Floating on air reminds me of the big balloons that car dealers put up at their showrooms." Then, another respondent  might say, " Maybe the brand should have a big car-shaped balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade because that's a really American holiday to show off really American cars."   

Personal Analogies

 In the "Personal Analogy” exercise,  we direct the respondents  to  become part of the  subject of the session:  For example, if you were trying to come up with new ways to combat subway graffiti, they could be told to envision themselves as a spray paint can and then try to come up with solutions or ideas. Or you might ask respondents  to visualize themselves as balloons and to think about how to prevent graffiti on a famous building like the Eiffel Tower (and then respondents would  discuss those ideas relative to the subway graffiti situation to see if they are feasible).

Role playing

Hypno-Synectics uses "Role-playing" as a way to come up with new ideas. As an example, a respondent   might be given the role of Marie Antoinette and told to "get into the role: the costume, the 18th century environment of Paris, etc." and would then be told to decide which brand of automobile she would buy. Again, by making the familiar into something "strange" we hope to come up with a new way to look at the subject. Another example of “role-playing” would be to give the respondent   the role of Willie Shoemaker, the famous jockey, and ask them to decide how Willie would go about selling a particular auto brand. The respondent  might come up with this idea: "Willie  would re-create an historic  race between a horse and  an early 20th Century model of that car brand at a race track,  to remind people of the brand’s legacy in the automotive industry.”  Then another respondent  might hitchhike and say, "That reminds me of that brand’s vehicles  in NASCAR races."  And, another respondent  might say, "The brand should have a video game  at its dealers where you drive a “virtual”  NASCAR vehicle." Other respondents  would be given different roles and asked how they would sell the auto brand: e.g.,  Albert Einstein, John Wayne, Donnie and Marie Osmond, etc. The idea is to get respondents  to take something familiar and put it into a  strange context from which something new can be generated.

Additional exercises

There are many additional exercises for the group to use as stimulus for their brainstorming. A few of them are the following: 

• Setting up examples that defy physical laws (“What would it be like if there was no gravity in the car dealer’s showroom ”)
• Putting  respondents  into anthropomorphic situations (“You are a butterfly in the car dealer’s showroom – what car features are you looking for?)
• Using non-verbal symbols (“Who would you choose  to write some unique music to symbolize that car brand ?”)

With each exercise, respondents  hitchhike on each others ideas and the Facilitator then brings the ideas back to the task of achieving  the brainstorming session’s goals.  During the brainstorming segments  respondents  will stay in the hypnosis state,  usually with their eyes closed. However, at times they will be told to stay in hypnosis but open their eyes so they can see ideas pasted up on the walls.

End of the session

After the key brainstorming exercises are concluded,  the moderator might ask the respondents  to focus on some of the best exercise results and  brainstorm in a more directed fashion just about those ideas.  There can also be a segment at the end where the respondents  are asked to exercise their critical judgments about some of the ideas  developed. A typical Hypno-Synectics brainstorming session can run for as long as 2  1/2 hours, but the length of time can be adjusted depending on the project’s requirements.

RESULTS FROM THE SESSIONS

At the conclusion of the session, the moderator distributes all the ideas generated  to the client. After reviewing the ideas, the client may wish to add on to the list or provide additional comments. Once all the comments have been received, the moderator provides a written summary of the session, including  conclusions and recommendations based on the session.