Psychopathology as a function of neuroticism and a hypnotically implanted aggressive conflict.

Hypnotically implanted paramnesias (false stories) designed to arouse an unacceptable aggressive impulse successfully generated psychopathology in experimental subjects who were high in neuroticism. Control subjects received a similar paramnesia that was designed to arouse an acceptable impulse. The induced psychopathology approximated that observed in a psychiatric outpatient population. Experimental subjects who directed their aggressive impulses at fictitious authority figures experienced more psychopathology than did experimental subjects who directed their impulses at an authority figure who was physically present. Experimental subjects told shorter Thematic Apperception Test stories and expressed more blatant anger and aggression in their stories than did the controls, but the two groups did not differ in terms of the amount of anger and aggression projected nor did they differ in the amount of paramnesia material projected.