Paranormal Beliefs and Idealism

The researcher

religion/spirituality fan
decent computer knowledge??
epic

Cole Milner

AP Capstone Diploma Candidate, Class of 2026

Problem Statement

Parapsychologists who study paranormal causation/phenomena attempt to remain ontologically neutral to avoid bias. But this might not reflect the views of members of the general population who hold paranormal beliefs.;.

Research Question

Are people with more paranormal beliefs more likely to see PK as reducible to ESP?

Definitions

Psychokinesis (PK) is the influence on a physical system through, according to Michael Thalbourne's Theory of Psychopraxia, pro attitude

Extra Sensory Perception (ESP) is the perception or knowledge of something outside of the traditional senses (touch, smell, etc.)

Hypothesis & Assumptions

Idealism in a paranormal context, as Storm & Thalbourne make clear, refers to the idea that PK can be reduced to ESP. Since idealism implies a universe of perception, PK would not be a material effect, but rather a manipulation of sense data. I believe that the more paranormal beliefs a person holds, the more likely they will see psi in this idealist way.

Significance

If we can understand the way that most paranormal believers understand paranormal phenomena, then we will be closer to understanding the causes for reports of these phenomena, and why people might be comfortable reporting what could easily be hallucinations as real events (since these perceptions would be real to an idealist).

Method

The Revised Paranormal Beliefs Scale (PBS) by J. J. Tobacyk will be used to measure the paranormal beliefs of participants. The participants will then be asked to rank how much they agree/disagree with two extra statements, to measure their ontological beliefs in the paranormal sense. The correlation between each PBS section and the measure of the participant's materialist/idealist leanings will then be calculated, and this will answer the research question.

Important Sources

Extra-Sensory Perception by J. B. Rhine - This is a major foundational source in parapsychology, defining the basic terms of the field.

The Theory of Psychopraxia by Storm & Thalbourne - This source explains paranormal causation quite well, but more importantly describes the materialist/idealist conceptions of parapsychology, where ESP is reduced to PK or PK is reduced to ESP within an ontological framework.

Relevance of Psychical Research to Philosophy by C. D. Broad - This source is important for understanding the basic limiting principles of the world which define paranormal phenomena - important for connecting idealism to paranormal beliefs.

Method

The method was a quantitative correlational design using a 28 item survey. The first 26 items were those included in the PBS, and the last two were items used to measure the "psi idealism" of each participant (the extent to which they reduce PK to ESP). I finally tested the correlation between each PBS category and psi idealism.

Results (table above)

The first 9 rows are survey responses, the last row is the correlation between each column (PBS category) and psi idealism.

Contrary to my hypothesis, all correlations are negative, suggesting that (if results were conclusive) psi idealism is correlated negatively with paranormal beliefs. One reason for this could be an unintentionally materialist cohort, considering I posted the survey on r/SampleSize, a Subreddit for students and researchers to post/answer surveys.

Conclusion and Implications

Because my study received only 9 responses, the data does not meet the central limit theorem and is therefore inconclusive. However, there are important implications of this research for parapsychology. Firstly, it is possible that idealists are in fact (as hinted by the data) less likely to hold paranormal beliefs. This could also not be the case - and I think it's important that this topic receives further inquiry.

If future researchers decide to inquire into this subject, they should address some of the mistakes which I've made. Firstly, they should use a more accurate tool of measuring paranormal beliefs (since the PBS contains items which represent beliefs that do not contradict the limiting principles as defined by Broad). Secondly, they should design a more elaborate and less vague method of measuring the "psi idealism" of participants.

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