Zusammenfassung der Ressource
Anomalistic Psychology
- THE STUDY OF ANOMALOUS
EXPERIENCE
- PSEUDOSCIENCE AND PARAPSYCHOLOGY
- Pseudoscience - masquerading as
science (the features)
Anmerkungen:
- *Lacks falsifiability - hypotheses can't be disproved because they are 'jealous' phenomena.
*Lacks controlled, replicable research, e.g. Bem(2011) no replicated.
*Lacks theory to explain phenomena, e.g. ESP.
*Burden of proof misplaced on sceptic.
*Lacks ability to change explanations.
- Occam's razor
Anmerkungen:
- If there are two competing explanations, simpler one is to be preferred - paranormal explanations are too convoluted
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Paranormal research is not the only pseudoscience - some Freudian hypotheses also unfalsifiable.
*Koch(1992) argues that psychology lacks objective theories.
*Mousseau(2003) - paranormal research often matches standards of scientific research, or even betters it (e.g. publishing negative results).
*The AAAS accepted the Parapsychological Association as a member.
*Reasons to be concerned about paranormal research include: making money out of unfounded claims, not asking for evidence.
- METHODOLOGICAL ISUUES
- ESP (GANZFELD)
Anmerkungen:
- Significant results could be due to other factors, e.g.:
*Researcher bias - sheep-goat effect in receiver's elaborations (Wooffitt).
*Expectations affect outcome of meta-analysis - Honorton vs Hyman.
*File-drawer effect - results of meta-analyses change according to which studies are left out.
*Lack of control - lack of soundproofing and order of presentation.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Positive results could be due to phenomena being 'jealous'.
*Autoganzfeld improved control (e.g. random display of targets).
*This still led to positive results by Honorton et al. but not Milton and Wiseman, although this was criticised by Bem et al.
*Fraudulent research by Sargent still included in data; fraud may be a particular problem in parapsychology.
- PSYCHOKINESIS (PK)
Anmerkungen:
- *Expectations created in study by Wiseman and Greening led to macro-PK reports.
*Lack of control - well-controlled studies show no effect (Hansel).
*Ecological validity - micro-PK may not represent paranormal action.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Quality of studies not related to positive results (Radin and Nelson, 2003), same findings from non-believers (Bosch et al., 2006).
*Significant effects not due to a small group of investigators nor to file-drawer effect (Radin and Nelson, 2003).
*Bierman (2000) - steady decline in effect size over years, suggesting phenomena not real.
- RESEARCH INTO EXCEPTIONAL
EXPERIENCE
- PSYCHIC HEALING AND MEDIUMSHIP
- PSYCHIC HEALING
- Explanations
Anmerkungen:
- *Energy fields re-aligned by e.g. therapeutic touch.
*Reduction of anxiety through psychological support.
*Placebo effect - expectations of benefit created by success stories which could be due to spontaneous recovery.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Lyvers et al. (2006) - no evidence for psychic healing, believers improved more.
*No placebo effect for prayers for cardiac recovery (Benson et al., 2006)
- Research studies
Anmerkungen:
- *Wirth (1990) - tested patients treated with TT or no touch - former recover faster.
*Rosa et al. (1998) - TT practitioners unable to detect 'energy field' of experimenter's hand.
*Cha et al. (2001) - effect of prayer on infertile women, twice as many became pregnant
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Rosa et al. study invalid because experimenter not ill.
*study repeated (Long et al., 1999), results better than chance, however this may be through heat detection.
*Wirth's results haven't been replicated, and Wirth was subsequently convicted of criminal fraud.
*Power of prayer study - one researcher has withdrawn their name.
- PSYCHIC MEDIUMSHIP
- Explanations
Anmerkungen:
- *Clues help medium produce accurate information without psychic ability (cold reading).
*Use of general statements (Barnum statements) and willingness of sitters to elaborate.
*Fraud - psychic mediumship is big business so people resort to complex and convincing strategies.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Sitters willing to be deceived.
*Supported by mock seance (Wiseman et al., 2003).
- Research studies
Anmerkungen:
- *Schwartz et al. (2001) - accuracy of medium statements about 80%.
*Rock and Beischel (2008) - mediums responding differently to dead or living loved ones.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *O'Keeffe and Wiseman (2005) - five mediums gave readings to five sitters producing 25 statements which were rated by sitters as having little relevance.
*Schwartz et al. - undergraduates not suitable as control group.
*Sheep-goat effect - positive findings from believers.
- OUT-OF-BODY AND
NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES
- OUT-OF BODY
EXPERIENCE
- Explanations
Anmerkungen:
- *Paranormal - mind and body separated.
*Sensory input is disturbed, reconstruction based on bird's-eye view (Blackmore, 1982).
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Alvarado (1982) found no evidence of parasomatic body having physically moved.
*Link between sensory disturbance and OOBEs - Blanke et al. (2002) and Ehrsson (2007).
*Individual differences, e.g. OOBEs reported more often by believers and those prone to fantasy.
- Research studies
Anmerkungen:
- *Green (1968) - 400 personal accounts of OOBEs, 20% 'prasomatic', rest 'asomatic'.
*Use of induced OOBEs (Alvarado, 1982) - weak but occasionally startling results.
*Blanke et al. (2002) - stimulation of temporal-parietal junction of the brain resulted in OOBEs.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Difficult to study OOBEs scientifically because occur without predictability.
*Artificially induced OOBEs not seen as equivalent.
*Physiological explanations are reductionist
- NEAR-DEATH
EXPERIENCE
- Explanations
Anmerkungen:
- *Evidence of an afterlife or 'soul' due to paranormal beliefs.
*Endorphins released at time of stress, lead to feelings of euphoria and detachment (Carr, 1982).
*REM intrusions due to hypoxia disrupt integration of sensory information.
*Hypoxia triggers a flood of glutamate which is blocked by the brain to prevent neural death, leading to an NDE.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Likely to be a psychological component because NDEs not experienced by all.
*Cardiac survivors regarded NDE as a spiritual experience, but this doesn't mean that spiritual factors cause NDEs.
*Cultural differences and similarities suggest that both psychological and physiological factors important.
- Research studies
Anmerkungen:
- *Ring (1980) - survivors describe NDE as peaceful and like a life review.
*Nelson et al. (2006) - NDE group more likely to experience REM intrusions.
*Jansen (1993) - ketamine can produce symptoms of NDEs, and ketamine has same effects as glutamate (Jansen, 2009).
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Early studies poorly controlled.
*Interviewer bias may affect data collected.
- EXPLANATIONS FOR ANOMALOUS
EXPERIENCE
- COINCIDENCE AND PROBABILITY
- THE ROLE OF COINCIDENCE
Anmerkungen:
- *Illusion of causality - if two things happen at same time, 'sheep' more likely to believe that one has caused the other.
*Illusion of connection - making links between unrelated items.
*Illusion of control - explanations for coincidence give sense of order in world, more likely in 'sheep' (Ayeroff and Abelson, 1976).
*General cognitive ability - lower intelligence more likely to be believers.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Adaptive significance - Type 1 errors of causal thinking tolerated in order to avoid Type 2 errors.
*Illusion of connection - may be created by higher levels of dopamine (Brugger et al., 2008).
*Making links also adaptive and may underlie creativity (Thalbourne, 1998).
*Illusion of control supported by Whitson and Galinsky (2008).
*General cognitive ability - not always confirmed in all studies, e.g. Jones et al. (1977) found complete opposite.
- THE ROLE OF PROBABILITY
JUDJEMENTS
Anmerkungen:
- *Paranormal experiences are a cognitive illusion due to attributing cause to random events (Blackmore and Troscianko, 1985).
*Tested using repetition avoidance (e.g. birthday party paradox), conjunction vignettes (estimate probability).
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Blackmore (1997) - no difference between sheep and goats on probability task.
*Evidence shows belief is linked to probability misjudgement but not necessarily a cause.
*Probability misjudgement may be linked to low cognitive ability.
*Probability misjudgements can alternatively be explained in terms of failing to understand heuristics, such as representativeness (Kahneman and Tversky, 1972).
- SUPERSTITIOUS BEHAVIOUR
AND MAGICAL THINKING
- EXPLANATIONS FOR
SUPERSTITIOUS BEHAVIOUR
Anmerkungen:
- *Making erroneous causal links (Type 1 error) is adaptive.
*Skinner (1947) - superstitions develop when an accidental stimulus-response link is learned, and then maintained through negative reinforcement (dual process).
*Superstitions develop to give an illusion of control (Whitson and Galinsky, 2008).
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Skinner provided evidence from study of pigeons, who acquired superstitions.
*Staddon and Simmelhag (1971) repeated Skinner's experiment and found 'superstitious' behaviours unrelated to food reward.
*Matute (1996) - humans did learn to press a button despite no actual effectiveness.
*Some superstitions are learned indirectly (cultural), provide sense of control.
*Illusion of control increases self-efficacy (Damish et al., 2010).
- EXPLANATIONS FOR
MAGICAL THINKING
Anmerkungen:
- *Freud (1915) - a form of child-like thinking, a defence mechanism in adults.
*Dual processing theory - thought is intuitive or logical.
*Animism (Piaget, 1954) - association of objets with feelings, e.g. feng shui.
*Nominal thinking - names of objects affect our feelings about them, e.g. a jar labelled cyanide (Rozin et al., 1986).
*Law of contagion - magical thinking is adaptive to avoid disease (Nemeroff and Roxin, 1994).
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Experimental support with voodoo dolls - participants fell more responsible if they had bad thoughts (Pronin et al., 2006).
*May act like a placebo and provide positive expectations (e.g. Rosenthal and Jacobsen, 1968 - self-fulfilling prophecy).
*Costs - associated with ,ental disorder, e.g. schizophrenia and OCD.
*Benefits - avoid 'depression realism', lack of magical thinking liked to low levels of dopamine (Mohr et al., 2005).
*Real-world application - increase willingness to donate organs for transplant (Vamos, 2010).
- PERSONALITY FACTORS IN
ANOMALOUS EXPERIENCE
- EYSENCK'S PERSONALITY
FACTORS
Anmerkungen:
- *Neuroticism - negative emotional states reduced by paranormal beliefs (defence mechanism).
*Extraversion - people more open to paranormal beliefs.
*Positive correlation with neuroticism (Williams et al., 2007) and with extraversion (Honorton et al., 1992).
- MORE IMAGINATIVE
PERSONALITY
Anmerkungen:
- *Fantasy proneness - becoming so deeply absorbed in fantasy to believe it real, demonstrated in fake seance (Wiseman et al., 2003).
*Suggestibility - more willing to believe fakes, link demonstrated by Hergovich (2003).
*Creative personalities make links between unrelated items (Thalbourne, 2001).
- OTHER FACTORS
Anmerkungen:
- *Locus of control, field dependence, higher sensation seeking and dissociation.
- Evaluation
Anmerkungen:
- *Method used to measure paranormal beliefs affects correlations with personality factors.
*Wiseman and Watt (2004) found correlation with neuroticism only when negative beliefs of PBS measured.
*Evidence that psychoticism is linked to some paranormal beliefs (Francis et al., 2010).
*Locus of control - depends on type of paranormal belief, some correlate positively with externality, some negatively.
*Susceptibility might explain recollection of alien abductions (Clancy et al., 2002).
*Paranormal experiences may be false beliefs, more common in susceptible people, supported by French and Wilson (2006).
*Some evidence of link with mental disorder but more likely satisfies a need for some people, e.g. abuse in childhood may lead to fantasy proneness and need for a greater sense of control.