• Humanistic psychologists have claimed James to be an early founder
• Portions of his work on altered states, religious states, hypnosis and paranormal states
  were ignored. As psychology has evolved new methods of investigation, these areas
  are once again being actively researched.

Psychedelic Research

• William James was interested in the influence of plant substances on consciousness.
• The finding that a person may lose what he or she calls "personal" identity without feeling
  a loss of identity goes back to James’, who described the self not as a stable, fixed structure
  but as a constantly fluctuating field.
• The discovery and examination of substances used in religious rituals, which have proved
  to be active psychedelic agents, have received interests among theologians in the origin
  and meaning of chemically induced religious experiences.

Biofeedback Research

• James theories that emotion depends on feedback from one’s body has been expanded
  in a variety of ways through biofeedback research.
• Biofeedback is a means of monitoring a biological process.
• Conditions that respond to biofeedback are tension and migraines, headaches,
  asthma, epilepsy, and many others.

Meditation

• James participated in meditation and yoga with professional and renowned teachers he
  was into it before it was "popular"
• Meditation can be defined as the directing stilling or focusing of one’s attention in
  a systematic manner.

Hypnosis

• James was an expert hypnotist and wrote extensively on the subject and
  conducted numerous experiments and demonstrations.
• Hypnosis had been rehabilitated as a medical tool and James and his colleagues at
  Harvard used it to investigate both mediums in the trance state and hysterics suffering
  from psychopathology.
• Some of it’s applications today include psychotherapy, athletic training, techniques
  for modulating pain

Automatic Writing - The Hidden Observer

• James conducted early work in this field where he believed that in hypnosis some part
  of the personality may be aware of some of what is going on.

Multiple Personality

• James was an early pioneer in the development of personality theory, studying cases
  of multiple personality, examining the variety of states of consciousness it is possible for
  the normal person to experience, and even positing a growth oriented dimension to
  personal development

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