Yet more NLP BS

[Toke]

There was/is a guy on the forum who performs hypnosis shows.

His explanation on how it worked was that the volunteers wanted to show off on stage and get the attention, the whole thing is fake/playacting with no compulsion involved.

He still got some amazing performances at swingers clubs though.

 

[fuelair]

What do you think of these two characters:

Ross Jeffries, whose website is speedseduction.biz
Kenrick Cleveland, maxpersuasion.com

The first one claims to be able to hypnotize any woman into bed by using hypnotic patterns full of embedded commands (ericksonian hypnotic suggestions), which will describe a state (like arousal, for instance) and then link it to yourself by means of an anchor (if i understand correctly, the "anchor" has its origin in pavlovian psychology). I've looked through some forums and found guys claiming to have "created a hypnotized sex slave by using Speed Seduction", and stuff like that. Sounds like BS, but the reasoning behind it is quite clever.

The second guy has applied the same principles to sales. He has some videos on youtube where he's setting an "amnesia anchor" and his products claim to be able to destroy any objection from costumers, etc, etc.

The two nlp-spawns need debunking. What do you guys think?

Don't bother, if it works, kill them.

 

[MaartenVergu]

I would ask Maartenn to pick one topic like Anchoring and argue it isn't baloney.

I want to explain it, but my English is not so good. So I will try it.

You can do the experiment for yourself.

Everyone has the experience of listening to a beautiful song, and suddenly you are in a whole other state of mind. (emotions and feelings are suddenly coming up).
That song is an anchor or a stiumulus for a mood or a state of mind.
This state of mind generates other behavior, trains of thoughts, feelings etc., different from when you are not in that state of mind in order to cope with the problemsituation.

The state of mind, your experienced feelings are a crucial factor in NLP to change your attitude towards something.

Do the experiment:
Think about a situation where you feel stressed. Find the trigger: what causes the stress?
Then play your favorite song and do your favorite dance.
Then think about the stress situation and push the play button of your favorite song, while dancing.
You will experience the stress situatie differently.

The trigger of the problemsituation and the anchor (the favorite song) for the nice feelings are connected together and they cause a different attitude towards the problemsituation.

That's how NLP helps you to use resourceful states or emotions to cope with stressful situations.

Another example:
They ask you to go back to a situation (using your memory) where you felt selfconfident.
You must bring that situation, when youa are feeling very confident, to life here and now.
What were you doing? What is the situation? What do you see, hear, smell around you? How are you walking etc.

Then use this situation as an anchor to connect it to the trigger of the problemsituation (where you are not self confident).
Experience how you act differently in the problemsituation.

When you repeat this (song and dancing and triggering problem situation), a whole new connection is made in your brain between firing neurons.

You experience a new attitude towards the problemsituation.

Is the anchoring technique 'perfect'? No, it is not.
Does it make sense. Does it work? Yes, to me, it makes sense. It works.

 

[MaartenVergu]

Anchoring is a technique for creating and changing the associated feelings experienced in response to a stimulus.

 

[Senex]

Perhaps I'm overly sensitive, but that sounds like manipulation to me.

Carnegie never understood the value of the truculent jerk. Maybe he had lousy Thanksgivings with the relatives.

"Happiness doesn't depend on any external conditions, it is governed by our mental attitude."

Mmmm... OK. And our mental attitude isn't based on external conditions? It damn well ought to be. Maybe old Dale is thinking of happy Negroes singing spirituals while they pick cotton in the blazing sun.

But my favorite bit of DC trivia?
"Perhaps one of Carnegie's most successful marketing moves was to change the spelling of his last name from "Carnagey" to Carnegie, at a time when Andrew Carnegie (unrelated) was a widely revered and recognized name." -- Wiki.

Wow, I think if you reviewed what he wrote you wouldn't find it all that offensive. It's less about manipulating others and more about how not to be a jerk in my opinion.

Huh. I apparently participated in this thread 6+ years ago, but I don't remember doing so, nor do I remember what "NLP" stands for.

That pirate lifestyle doesn't do wonders for the memory. I found it interesting to see the changes in my posting style. My pirate lifestyle today isn't as bad as it was.


It's up to Maartenn to take up that mantle for NLP. He said:

Anchoring works, but there are many conditions in order to let it work. (the stimulus must be unique, the experience or state must be intense enough, the timing of anchoring must be just right, the anchor must be repeatable etc.)

Let's here a story about how anchoring worked for him when dealing with another person.

 

[tsig]

Anchoring is a technique for creating and changing the associated feelings experienced in response to a stimulus.

Alcohol works better.

 

[Daylightstar]

Anchoring is a technique for creating and changing the associated feelings experienced in response to a stimulus.

What I'm getting from you is that 'anchoring' requires susceptibility.

For instance, on this site, there are a number of people repeating what you referred to as a song and dance

... (song and dancing and triggering problem situation), a whole new connection is made in your brain between firing neurons.
...

but it is quite apparent that they are not solving any problem nor form new connections in their brains.

None whatsoever.

What are they doing wrong?

 

[Daylightstar]

Here's an interesting link about NLP:
http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/neurolinguistic-programming-and-other-nonsense/



p.s. didn't look if it has been posted here previously.

 

[marplots]

Is the anchoring technique 'perfect'? No, it is not.
Does it make sense. Does it work? Yes, to me, it makes sense. It works.

Shouldn't it work just as well the other way around? My favorite, relaxing song is ruined because I've linked it to an anxiety-producing event?

One other nuance. You seem to take it for granted that imagining a state is equivalent to experiencing that state in its native context. Is it? This is a supposition in NLP I find lacking.

 

[MaartenVergu]

Shouldn't it work just as well the other way around? My favorite, relaxing song is ruined because I've linked it to an anxiety-producing event?

That's possible.

One other nuance. You seem to take it for granted that imagining a state is equivalent to experiencing that state in its native context. Is it? This is a supposition in NLP I find lacking.

The technique is not 'to imagine a state'. You must go back to a moment in time (with your memory) where you had that state. You must imagine that the past event is happening now. What do you see, hear, smell etc. how do you behave. Try to remember all the fine details of that past event, and bring it here and now. The state of mind will come automatically when you do that. Then you anchor the state at the top of the experience.

You can recall any memories when you have experienced the required state. Recall them vividly and you recall the state. So you can recall any memories of being extremely calm and relaxed to get the resource for your anchor.

You might recall being calm and relaxed at work, for example, or from a time when you were at home or enjoying your leisure time.

To vivify the memory use instructions as:

Recall a time when you were calm and relaxed. As you go back to that time now step into your body and you are seeing now what you see in the memory, hearing now what you heard in the memory, and feeling now, what you feel in the memory.

Even people who think they have no resourceful memory can find such a memory perhaps in a different context.


(the scepticism against NLP is by people who don't know anything about it and didn't follow any of the courses at all).

 

[MaartenVergu]

Here's an interesting link about NLP:
http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/neurolinguistic-programming-and-other-nonsense/



p.s. didn't look if it has been posted here previously.

I don't believe in the assumption of NLP that you can model an expert by mirroring his or her behavior. But NLP is a set of techniques and models. Some models or techniques work, others don't. You cannot talk about 'NLP' in general.

The meta-model is a very useful model. I gave you the link. Please read it, before you conclude that it is nonsense.
The idea of backtracking or following the ideas of the other person is sometimes useful (in solving conflicts f.e.).
Negotiating between parts to solve inner conflicts is a useful model too.
But other assumptions can be wrong.

It's a false dillemma, to choose between the labels 'nonsense' or 'scientific'.
It's the choice between some techniques or models which are useful and work and others don't.

 

[MaartenVergu]

Here's an interesting link about NLP:
http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/neurolinguistic-programming-and-other-nonsense/



p.s. didn't look if it has been posted here previously.

People who are labeling NLP as 'nonsense' have investigated only a few assumptions of it.
You can not just give it the lable nonsense or not. There are useful techniques and some models and some ideas of NLP are also been used by psychologists with a scientific background. (meta-model f.e.)

 

[marplots]

The technique is not 'to imagine a state'. You must go back to a moment in time (with your memory) where you had that state. You must act as if it is happening now. What did you see, hear, how did you behave. Try to remember all the fine details of that experience. The state of mind will come automatically. Then you anchor the state.

This is a bit backwards from how we understand memories to actually work. The emotional content is used to create the narrative and specifics in an ad hoc fashion, not the other way around. But it shouldn't matter to the anchoring idea anyhow - nor should it matter if the state is completely imagined, since it serves the same function.

There are still plenty of problems with the idea. It's damn hard to test. If I fail to anchor well enough to alter my behavior/response, is it because the principle is bad, or because I didn't use it properly? Further, there are serious measurement problems - did it work a little bit? Wonderfully well? Not at all? For this problem but not that? And generally, the person deciding the value is also the patient. Instead of these, we'd prefer an objective, outside measurement with a clear scale.

It's also very difficult to pin down practitioners on just what exactly the claim is supposed to be. "Feel better," "More effective" and the like are tough claims to challenge - they are very slippery.

(the scepticism against NLP is by people who don't know anything about it and didn't follow any of the courses at all).

Of course. This is why it is valuable to discuss it with those who have. By asking questions and expressing doubt, we can explore and judge the answers from those more educated in the subject. As a good critical thinker yourself, I expect you have already asked similar questions and found reasonable answers.

 

[MaartenVergu]

You can think about anchoring as follows:

Sometimes one intensive state of fearness and panic is enough to have a strong connection between the triggers and the response.
When the trigger was unique and the respons was very intense. (a bomb blasting f.e.)
By recalling the cues of the bad experience, the whole behavior and emotion arise. (f.e. firework can activate the traumatic experience)

There is evidence for that: traumatic events.

NLP claims that one conncetion between an intensive state of mind and (a) unique trigger(s) can be enough to have a good connection (in the brain) between seeing, smelling or hearing a trigger (anchor) and your response. (state).

 

[MaartenVergu]

You can test this with this simple experiment:

You smile everytime someone laughs hard. (see picture below)
Your smile becomes the trigger for the state of mind of this person.

Observe carefully that the stimuli are timed correctly:

Another experiment you can do;

meditate or bring youself in a relaxed state of mind.
Use a certain song and a certain aroma from candles. (use trance music and incense f.e.)

Use only that specific song and that specific smell for this relaxation state.
Use only this specific body posture and these specific clothes for that state of relaxation.
Stop the song and fresh the room when you are not in that state of mind anymore. Change clothes when you do not relax anymore.

Don't use this song and these clothes or these candles somewhere else. Only in this context, in that specific room.

After a while, the clothes and the song and these candles and that specific room will trigger that specific state of mind.

When you use this room only for relaxing, the room becomes a trigger for the relaxed state of mind.

It's like pavlov's conditioning, but for states of mind.


Other anchor experiments:

Think about fetish f.e. Only used in certain situations, it becomes a trigger for a state of mind.
When you only use your sports outfit when you sport, then it will trigger (anchor) the state of mind of 'being fit' when you wear them.
When you only see the flag of your country when you are singing in a trance, the flag will trigger this state of mind.
When you only hear a certain kind of music on funerals (from the organ f.e.) and you do not listen to that music elsewhere, it becomes a trigger for a mourning mood when you suddenly hear it in another context.
Buddhists use gong and drum. Islamic people use q'oran recicitations. (But they don't know how to use it as an effective anchor for states of mind.)

Salesmen will use anchors to connect states of minds to products.

You can use your businesscard. Use a unique logo. Show this logo only on parties, where people are in a good mood.
When someone see this unique logo suddenly somewhere else, the state of mind of the party will come up.

 

[marplots]

Other anchor experiments:

Think about fetish f.e. Only used in certain situations, it becomes a trigger for a state of mind.
When you only use your sports outfit when you sport, then it will trigger (anchor) the state of mind of 'being fit' when you wear them.
When you only see the flag of your country when you are singing in a trance, the flag will trigger this state of mind.
Etc.

Salesmen will use anchors to connect states of minds to products.

You can use your businesscard. Use a unique logo. Show this logo only on parties, where people are in a good mood.
When someone see this unique logo suddenly somewhere else, the state of mind of the party will come up.

These are good examples based on operant conditioning a la Pavlov. However, you forgot to mention an associated phenomena: extinction.

From Wiki:
"Extinction is observed in both operantly conditioned and classically conditioned behavior. When operant behavior that has been previously reinforced no longer produces reinforcing consequences the behavior gradually stops occurring. In classical conditioning, when a conditioned stimulus is presented alone, so that it no longer predicts the coming of the unconditioned stimulus, conditioned responding gradually stops. For example, after Pavlov's dog was conditioned to salivate at the sound of a bell, it eventually stopped salivating to the bell after the bell had been sounded repeatedly but no food came."

But your example of anchoring brings up other issues with NLP. Primarily, it's a collage of methodologies in search of an underlying theory.

While I found value in the original work, NLP has become an accretion of poorly applied psychological tricks, taken ad hoc from applied psychology in the kind of faddish way that popular diets run away with otherwise decent ideas from nutritionists. The self-help industry has so polluted the waters that it's nearly impossible to extract and evaluate the techniques offered up. We get the usual suggestion of "Try it and see what works for you." Or, even worse, the "Fake it until you make it."

From a skeptical point of view, there's an even deeper issue. It's the tension between materialism and idealism. To what extent are we going to accept that mental states are driven by other mental states and to what extent should we look to environmental factors?

In the idealist paradigm, what I think about the world becomes reality for me. Under this rubric, perception is reality and a willful modification of mental states has the same currency as any other.

The materialist points out that mental states are a function of environmental cues - both internal and external. I am afraid, not because I choose to be afraid, but because there is something to fear. My depression is best treated by making my brain less sensitive to those chemical messengers associated with mood disorders.

To the extent that NLP takes proven methods from applied psychology and uses them appropriately, I can have no criticism. But then I should ask what NLP contributes, if the information is already out there? What does the theory suggest on it's own? Oh yeah - I don't think there actually is a theory on offer. But it's been awhile since I've visited the material, perhaps you can enlighten me?

Are "scripts" still a thing in NLP? Remember, one root idea was that accessing the hidden mental processes by way of language was effective (the "neuro" and the "linguistic" part of NLP) in altering mood/behavior. Your salesman example is one such, as well as "cuing" by way of subterfuge and layered "key words." I think you've implied you reject this part of NLP, but to me, it seems like a defining characteristic.

In the end though, I don't see a way to separate out the reasonable from the silly when it comes to NLP as a class. I'd suggest CBT instead, although it too is less robust than we'd like. At least CBT has some reasonable efforts at standardization and academic study behind it.

I think you may be in the position of mining Scientology for the gold. Indeed, there may be some gold in the rubble of Scientology. But the criticism holds for both Scientology and NLP - that which is valuable isn't original, and that which is original is tainted. One difficulty is in the misuse of terms.

"Anchoring" is a well-characterized phenomenon in psychology, but I don't think it is used in quite the same way as you have presented it. This too is a hallmark of a serious lack of rigor. Is it an outright attempt to deceive? I don't know, one cannot tell the blundering amateur from the conman.

Here is what anchoring means: http://www.psych-it.com.au/Psychlopedia/article.asp?id=135

 

[MaartenVergu]

You gave me a few interesting arguments against anchoring.

Your first argument was:

"Shouldn't it work just as well the other way around? My favorite, relaxing song is ruined because I've linked it to an anxiety-producing event?"

I think, when the technique of anchoring works, it must work the other way around too. I agree.

And your other argument is the argument of 'extinction'. After a while, the anchor does not work anymore. But in NLP, they 'believe' that a new stimulus-respons connection is formed in the brain.

They call it 'collapsing anchors'.
It means: the conditioned stimulus of the recourseful state and the trigger of the problemcontext are activated togehter, so a new connection in the brain exists: the connection: trigger and new emotion. (conditioned state of mind).
After a while the trigger will activate the new emotion. They don't talk about extinction of the response.

Your other argument is: it already exists in psychology (behaviourist school of thought),

I agree.

 

[Daylightstar]

...
The meta-model is a very useful model. I gave you the link. Please read it, before you conclude that it is nonsense. ...

The link appeared here:

-The meta-model is very useful in converstations; http://www.nlpls.com/articles/NLPmetaModel.php
...

From that link:

As described by Bandler and Grinder, "Deletion is a process by which we selectively pay attention to certain dimensions of our experience and exclude others. Take, for example, the ability that people have to filter out or exclude all other sound in a room full of people talking in order to listen to one particular person's voice... Deletion reduces the world to proportions which we feel capable of handling. The reduction may be useful in some contexts and yet be the source of pain in others.

^{Hilite by Daylightstar}
How do you feel about 'Deletion'? Is that something you recognize in yourself?

 

[Daylightstar]

And, also from that link:

The function, then, of the Meta Model is to help us identify problematic deletions, ...

How would you identify such 'problematic deletions'?

 

[MaartenVergu]

What does NLP offer when the content of NLP already exists in psychology?
NLP is actually using an eclectic perspective in psychology. http://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.php?term=Eclectic Perspective

It (sometimes) already exists, but NLP makes working models or step by step procedures (techniques) to be able to do something with the already existing theory. It's an eclectic psychologic approach (it can be used in therapy, in teaching, in business, etc.). Eclectic means: an integration of different techniques and models from different schools of thought.