biology

Paul McKenna

Paul McKenna is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Paul McKenna rather than just read about it. In short: Paul McKenna (born 8 November 1963) is a British hypnotist, behavioural scientist, television and radio broadcaster, and author of self-help books. McKenna has hosted self-improvement television shows and presents seminars in hypnosis, neuro-linguistic programming, weight loss, motivation, the Zen meditation Big Mind, Amygdala Depotentiation Therapy (ADT) and the Havening techniques.

Key takeaways

Paul McKenna belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Paul McKenna to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Paul McKenna from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Paul McKenna (born 8 November 1963) is a British hypnotist, behavioural scientist, television and radio broadcaster, and author of self-help books. McKenna has hosted self-improvement television shows and presents seminars in hypnosis, neuro-linguistic programming, weight loss, motivation, the Zen meditation Big Mind, Amygdala Depotentiation Therapy (ADT) and the Havening techniques.

Early life McKenna was born in Enfield, London to a builder and a home economics teacher. He attended St Ignatius College. He was routinely bullied by his teachers for his dyslexia.

Career

Radio and television McKenna started working in Radio Top Shop aged 16, and went on to present for stations including Radio Caroline and Capital London. After two years presenting at BBC Radio 1 in the early 1990s, McKenna hosted a number of TV programmes, including The Hypnotic World of Paul McKenna (1993–97), The Paranormal World of Paul McKenna (1996–97) and Hyp the Streets (1999). He won the Television and Radio Industries Club Award for Best TV Newcomer in 1994. During this time, he continued his studies of hypnosis and neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) with Richard Bandler, the co-creator of NLP. McKenna appeared on series 4, episode 2 of Top Gear to hypnotise presenter Richard Hammond in 2004. In 2005, McKenna hosted the television show I Can Change Your Life on Sky One, which combined hypnotism with therapy as he tried to cure participants of both psychological and physical ailments. In October 2009 he was a guest on Private Passions, a music discussion programme on BBC Radio 3. From February 2014 to September 2015, McKenna hosted a talk show called McKenna, broadcast on Hulu and featuring "non-journalistic" interviews with Simon Cowell, Ryan Seacrest, Roger Moore, Rachael Ray, Tony Robbins and Richard Dawkins.

Hypnosis He became interested in hypnotism as a result of a guest who appeared on his show. He was taught hypnosis by Richard Bandler, with whom he continued to work closely for many years. While working at Capital Radio, McKenna began experimenting with small hypnosis shows in pubs and clubs, UK military bases and university events. He then starred in a regular Sunday night show at the Duke of York's Theatre, which was owned at the time by Capital Radio. The success of those shows led to his playing other theatres across the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, the US, Australia and Hong Kong.

Research In 1996, McKenna was granted a PhD from LaSalle University in Louisiana. It was legally licensed by the state, but it falsely claimed to be an accredited institution. The school exempted McKenna from coursework based on his prior work, and his dissertation was producing a series of self-help tapes that eventually became a book, Change Your Life in Seven Days. Discovery of this lack of accreditation prompted McKenna to obtain another PhD in 2003 from Revans University, an online institution based out of the Republic of Vanuatu. Revans’s accredited status was revoked in 2005 when it was discovered that students did not require the normal level of dedicated research in order to earn their degrees, and instead a legal loophole was being exploited. The title of his thesis was "The Effects of Fixed Action Patterns and Neuro-Linguistic Programming in Determining Outcomes in Human Behaviour". McKenna specialises in post-traumatic stress disorder, severe trauma, pain control and emotional overwhelm.

Self-help McKenna is the author of self-help and personal development books. He has practised one-to-one hypnotherapy on celebrity clients. He helped Daryl Hannah cope with stage fright when she starred in The Seven Year Itch. According to one of McKenna's books, Rob Brydon claimed that McKenna helped alleviate his fear of flying, Stephen Fry advocated for McKenna's weight loss strategies and David Walliams used McKenna to help with his swim across the English Channel. McKenna focuses on teaching people how to "deprogramme" their sugar cravings, claiming "sugar is the most dangerous drug in the world".

Libel lawsuits

Daily Star & National Enquirer In 1999, McKenna successfully sued both the Daily Star and National Enquirer for libel after they published articles that alleged he had damaged the mental health of a man whom he hypnotised in one of his shows. Both lawsuits resulted in six-figure settlements. The man involved had sued McKenna in a previous trial, but the judge dismissed the suit after concluding that there was no evidence that McKenna's stage hypnosis posed any risk to those taking part.

Daily Mirror In 2006, McKenna successfully sued the Daily Mirror for libel over claims made by former TV critic Victor Lewis-Smith that McKenna's qualification from LaSalle was a purchased "bogus degree" bought with the intention of deliberately defrauding the public. McKenna won the case, and the newspaper was ordered to pay £75,000 in costs. The judge, Justice Eady, said that while the scholarly characterisation of the degree was "another matter", McKenna did not believe the degree was "bogus or that he [had] misled anyone in allowing himself to be referred to as a PhD."

Published works

Notes

References

External links Official website Paul McKenna at IMDb

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Paul McKenna

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Paul McKenna claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Paul McKenna before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Paul McKenna ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Paul McKenna

In research: Paul McKenna appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Paul McKenna in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Paul McKenna is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1963 births, British hypnotists, British writers with disabilities, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Paul McKenna outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Paul McKenna in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Paul McKenna means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Paul McKenna out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Paul McKenna in simple terms?

Why does Paul McKenna matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Paul McKenna?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Paul McKenna.