....Ironically, the hardest evidence for the antidepressant effect of suggestion comes from a field viewed by many skeptical academics with the same disdain they once reserved for hypnosis: subliminal suggestion.

Subliminal suggestions or messages are too faint or fleeting to register consciously, but just strong enough to make their presence felt "unconsciously." Most clinical studies of subliminal suggestion have explored the unconscious impact of a Freudianly loaded message: "Mommy and I are one." The theory, rooted in psychoanalysis, is that this message, when perceived subliminally, can evoke "symbiotic fantasies" of being reunited with "the good mother" of infancy. And that's supposed to be good for you.

Recently a researcher analysed nearly 60 placebo-controlled clinical trials of the subliminal symbiotic prescription (5). There were some 2500 subjects in the studies, including 110 depressives. "Mommy and I are one" -- and, to a lesser extent, other subliminal symbiotic suggestions like "Daddy and I are one" -- tended to be very beneficial indeed. Among other things, they significantly relieved depression and anxiety, improved academic performance in students, and soothed schizophrenics. Remarkably, in most of these studies, the "Mommy message" was flashed before the subjects' eyes less than a dozen times over a few weeks -- less than a tenth of a second's worth of subliminal psychotherapy!

Evidence that subliminal auditory suggestions -- the kind found on self-help tapes -- can influence us is much more limited (6). In one double-blind study, depressed psychotherapy clients improved more with real subliminal tapes than with "placebo" ones (6). But in studies involving other conditions (such as overweight and drug dependency), placebo tapes have sometimes equalled subliminals (7).

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6. M. J. Urban, "Auditory Subliminal Stimulation: A Re-examination," Perceptual and Motor Skills, 74 (April 1992): 515-541.

7. P. M. Merikle and H. E. Skanes, "Subliminal Self-Help Audiotapes: A Search for Placebo Effects," Journal of Applied Psychology, 77 (October 1992): 772-776.