Students Play Phonographs In New Hypnosis Technique

Two students have found a way to hypnotize people with phonograph records. Paul I. Sparer '49 and Elton B. McNeil '49, authors of the experiment, are now ready to hand over their findings to anyone who wants to go further into the field, Sparer announced last night.

The new method is important for three reasons: 1) it saves time and labor for the hypnotist, who can take over where the record leaves off with his subject well in a trance; 2) it enables the psychologist to select good hypnotic subjects from among a group of people, without going through the time consuming preliminaries himself; 3) and it provides a standardized means of studying the effects of hypnotism since all subjects hear the same thing.

The trance-producing records will not be sold, Sparer stated. He recalled that Ralph Slater, a radio and stage hypnotist, had once started on the idea.