The act of categorizing reinforces memory, and on subsequent tests people are more likely to remember the words they practiced than those they did not. In one classic memory experiment, for example, participants study 48 words and then divide a subset of 24 of them into categories, like food or animal. Bem, the author of the original paper and one of the most prominent research psychologists of his generation, said he intended each experiment to mimic a well-known classic study, “only time-reversed.” Wagenmakers is co-author of a rebuttal to the ESP paper that is scheduled to appear in the same issue of the journal. “But such a hypothesis probably constitutes an extraordinary claim, and it should undergo more scrutiny before it is allowed to enter the field.”ĭr. “Several top journals publish results only when these appear to support a hypothesis that is counterintuitive or attention-grabbing,” Eric-Jan Wagenmakers, a psychologist at the University of Amsterdam, wrote by e-mail. Neglecting to take this into account - as conventional social science analyses do - makes many findings look far more significant than they really are, these experts say. Claims that defy almost every law of science are by definition extraordinary and thus require extraordinary evidence. Judd added, even though “there was no mechanism by which we could understand the results.”īut many experts say that is precisely the problem. “Four reviewers made comments on the manuscript,” he said, “and these are very trusted people.”Īll four decided that the paper met the journal’s editorial standards, Dr. The editor of the journal, Charles Judd, a psychologist at the University of Colorado, said the paper went through the journal’s regular review process. “I think it’s just an embarrassment for the entire field.” I can’t believe a major journal is allowing this work in,” Ray Hyman, an emeritus professor of psychology at the University Oregon and longtime critic of ESP research, said. Some scientists say the report deserves to be published, in the name of open inquiry others insist that its acceptance only accentuates fundamental flaws in the evaluation and peer review of research in the social sciences.
The studies include more than 1,000 subjects. Bem, an emeritus professor at Cornell, testing the ability of college students to accurately sense random events, like whether a computer program will flash a photograph on the left or right side of its screen.
The paper describes nine unusual lab experiments performed over the past decade by its author, Daryl J. Advance copies of the paper, to be published this year in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, have circulated widely among psychological researchers in recent weeks and have generated a mixture of amusement and scorn. The decision may delight believers in so-called paranormal events, but it is already mortifying scientists. One of psychology’s most respected journals has agreed to publish a paper presenting what its author describes as strong evidence for extrasensory perception, the ability to sense future events.
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