Western Daily Press reporter Alison Short remains "unconvinced" that reincarnation exists, even after undergoing past life regression.

Alison, (28), was hypnotised by local practitioner Sharon Stiles and was soon telling her all about her 'former life' - as a Nazi soldier.

But the sceptical journalist says she remains unconvinced, and instead thinks the hypnosis allowed her to delve deep into her memories of this life.

She said: "I've never really believed in reincarnation, and having been through this I don't think I have been taken back to a past life, but rather that it is an interesting way of going back into parts of my life."

Alison decided to try past life regression to coincide with the new ITV series Have I Been Here Before?, and after being hypnotised she began chatting about her life as Eric Schmidt, a Nazi soldier from a village called Vischen.

After the experiment she trawled the Internet to see if the village existed - and found a place called Fischen - but this still didn't convince her.

She said: "I have watched a lot of history prgrammes, I lived in Germany for a while and my dad was in the airforce so I have a military background."

Nevertheless, the 'memories' were vivid, and as Alison emerged from the experience she felt so emotional that she began to cry.

But after being told by hypnotist Sharon to "put those feelings in box", she woke up feeling happy and chilled out.

Alison said: "I think the feelings of loneliness that I had took me back to when I was at boarding school.

"I'd assumed that when you are hypnotised you would be unconscious and then you would come round and the hypnotist would tell you what you had said, but I was aware of what was going on.

"It was an interesting experience and I think it shows that there is part of the brain that we don't know about it and there is a lot we can tap into and don't understand yet.

"I haven't changed my opinion of past life regression. For me it wasn't a past life, just a few things that were buried in my mind and I started babbling about them!"