◆ SpookStack

Approved For Release 2003/09/10 : CIA-RDP96-00788R001300020001-6 NCLASSIFIED ST-CS-01-169-72 July 1972 Quite frequently, a number of hindering factors are present in the course of the training process, preventing the spontaneous adoption of the new material, its energizing and retention. The new aspect of the suggestopedic training process is that all means of suggestion ~ authority, complexity, intonation, music, etc. - have been scientifically selected and organized in a way as to achieve the memorization and creative assimilation of a considerable volume of data without student tension. Creating a favorable psycho- logical climate in class, suggestopedy converts the training process into an emotion of joy, into pleasure for the student and the teacher. Under these circumstances the personality of the student is freed from various hindering complexes. It is "liberated." New intellectual and memory reserves are discovered. It is this new psychological system and concept of the training process that is one of the major features of suggestopedia (174). 4, (U) According to Doctor Lozanov, the suggestopedic method allows an individual to learn five to fifty times faster. It is based on the yoga technique of relaxation - “Savasanna." Using suggestion and autosuggestion, muscle tension is relaxed and the brain is relieved of the usual anxieties and stresses. During suggestopedic sessions the alpha rhythm of rest predominates in the brain. The Soviets were among the first to seize on Bulgaria's suggestopedia, The Moscow Foreign Lanugage Pedagogical Institute has claimed resounding success with Lozanov's method (175). 5. (U) The Soviets, although they adopted some of Lozanov's teaching techniques, have appeared to search for more conclusive results in the use of autosuggestion. Early work was carried out under the direction of Professor A.M. Svyadoshch, of the Karaganda Medical Institute's Department of Psychiatry. It was reported in 1965 that as a result of a special four month training session, 40 out of 50 people learned how to produce, at will a significant change in their own skin temperature. To raise or lower the temperature they simply repeated to themselves for a short period of time the appropriate autosuggestion formula: “hand warm" or "hand cold." The Soviets found that the use of auto- suggestion during a state of muscular relaxation, known as autogenous training, makes possible a hypnotic state similar to that which is observed during hypnotic sleep. Moreover, a person is able to maintain control over his emotions and carry on further autosuggestion. Using ordinary verbal formulas, one can subject various organ systems to arbitrary effects during such a state (176). Autogenic training has been reported by the Soviets to be useful in the elimination 55 UNCLASSIFIED Approved For Release 2003/09/10 : CIA-RDP96-00788R001300020001-6