Erika Fromm, 93; Psychologist, Expert in the Use of Hypnosis

Erika Fromm, 93, an emeritus professor of psychology at the University of Chicago and an expert in the use of hypnosis, died Monday at her home in Chicago. The cause of death was not announced.

The daughter of a physician, she was born Erika Oppenheimer in Frankfurt, Germany.

Fromm earned her doctorate at the University of Frankfurt when she was 24, and moved to the Netherlands soon afterward because of the rising tide of Nazism.

She married Paul Fromm, a cousin of psychoanalyst Erich Fromm, and they moved to the United States in 1938.

She held a variety of teaching and research positions before joining the University of Chicago faculty in 1961.

According to the university, Fromm’s early work challenged some of Freud’s findings and sought ways in which to use hypnosis as a more effective means of helping people than psychoanalysis, which Fromm felt had become a therapy of the rich.

She used hypnosis and hypnoanalysis in her work with narcissistic patients and those suffering from post-traumatic stress disorders, particularly incest victims.

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Oleg Makarov, 70, a Soviet-era cosmonaut who took part in three space missions and survived a harrowing launch accident in which the booster rocket carrying his space capsule exploded after liftoff, died Monday of a heart attack, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported.