Mary Bates, PhD

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Animal Magnetism: What is Tonic Immobility?

Photo: Romanee., via Wikimedia Commons. Distributed under a CC-BY-SA 3.0 license.It's not quite hypnosis, but it sure looks like it. Some animals enter into a passive state of unresponsiveness if they're placed on their backs and restrained. So what is tonic immobility, and what does it look like in different animals? Read my latest Zoologic post: Can You Hypnotize a Shark?