Anomalous Experience

pseudoscience
1. lacks falsifiability
2. lacks carefully controlled, replicable research
3. lacks a therory to explain the effects
4. lacks ability to change
Methodological Issues
1. samll scale
2. file drawer effect
3. fraud: fraudulent research by Sargent still included in data
ESP
1. research biass: sheep and goats effec
2. lack of control: lack of soundproofing and order of presentation.
3. biased analysis
4. jealous phenomena: could lead to positive results
5. improvement in control
PK
1. expectations
2. lacks of control
3. Supprot form John et al 1997
4. Against from effect size
5. Against from file drawer effect
Anomalous PSychology
1. Role of Coincidence and probability Judgement
  1. Role of Coincidence
    1. illusion of causality: if teo things happen at same time, 'sheep' more likely to believe that one has cuaes the other.
    2. illusion of connection: making links between unrelated itms.
    3. illusion of control: explanations for coincidence give sense of order in world, more likely in 'sheep'(Ayerroff and Abelson, 1976).
    4. Adaptive significance- Type 1 erros of causal thinking tolertated in order to aviod Type 2 error.
    5. illusion of control suppirted by Witson and Galinshy 2008.
  2. Roe of Probability Judgement
    1. Paranormal experience are a cognitive illusion due to attributing cause to random event.
    2. Tested using repetition aviodance, questions about probability, and conjuction vignettes
    3. Blackmore 1997: no difference between sheep and goats on probability test.
    4. Probability midjudgement may links to low cognitive ability.
    5. Probability misjudgemtn can alternatively be explained in term of failling to understand heurtics.
2. Superstition behaviour and magical thinking
  1. Superstition
    1. Making erroneous casual links (Type 1 error) is adaptive.
    2. Skinner 1947: Superstitions develop when an accidental stimulus- response link is learned, and then maintained through negative reinforcement.
    3. Skinner provided evidence from study of pigeons.
    4. Matute 1996: humans did learn to press a button despite no actual effectiveness.
    5. Damish et al 2010: illusion of control increases self- efficacy.
  2. Magical Thinkging
    1. Freud 1915: a form of child-like thinking, a dence mechanism in adults.
    2. DUal processing theory
    3. Animism (Piaget 1954)
    4. Nominal thinking (Rozin et al. 1986)
    5. Law of contagion (Nemeroff and Rozin 1994)
    6. Voodoo experiment- ppts felt more responsible if they has bad thought. (Pronin et al. 2006)
    7. Costs- associated with mental disorder.
3. Personality Factors
  1. Eysenck's personality factors
    1. Neruoticism
    2. Extraversion
  2. More imagiinative Personality
    1. Fantasy proneness
    2. Suggestbility
      1. may explain recollection of alien abductions (Clancy el al. 2002)
    3. Creative personalities
4. Psychic healing and mediumship
  1. Psychic healing
    1. Energy filed re aligned by e.g. therapeutic touch.
    2. Placebo effect
    3. Lyvers et al 2006: no evidence for psychic healing, believers improved more.
    4. No placebo effect for prayers for cardiac recovery. (Benson et al. 2006)
    5. Schwartz et al. 2001
    6. Rock and Beischel 2008
  2. Psychic mediumship
    1. Cold reading
    2. Barmum effect
    3. Sitters willing to be deceived.
    4. S upported by mock seance (Wiseman et al. 2003)
5. Out-of-body and Near-Death Experiences
  1. OOBE
    1. Explanations: paranroal and biological
      1. Difficult to study OOBEs scientifically
      2. Articially-included OOBEs seen as equivalent.
  2. NEDs
    1. Evidence of an after or 'soul' due to paranormal beliefs
    2. Endorphins releases at time of stress, lead to feelings of euphoria and detachment (Carr, 1982)
    3. REM intrustions due to hypoxia disrupt integration of sensory information.

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Anomalous Experience

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	Created by yl38 over 10 years ago