Plain English Summary
What is it like to believe you have psychic powers? This rare study interviewed 12 self-described mediums, psychics, and clairvoyants about how they make sense of their abilities. Four themes emerged: formative childhood experiences, personal transcendent encounters interpreted as ESP, a felt sense of control over their powers, and a distinctive perception of reality. The fascinating takeaway is that these individuals weave coherent narratives from these threads, creating a self-reinforcing loop where belief and experience keep validating each other. Rather than testing whether the abilities are real, the study offers a window into the lived experience of people convinced they are.
Research Notes
Rare qualitative study of self-ascribed paranormal ability from the Drinkwater-Dagnall research program at Manchester Metropolitan University. Provides phenomenological context for understanding how individuals maintain belief in their abilities, complementing the library's experimental and skeptical papers on mediumship and psychic claims.
Investigated how 12 individuals with self-ascribed paranormal abilities (mediums, psychics, sensitives, clairvoyants) perceive and make sense of their professed powers through semi-structured interviews analyzed with reflexive thematic analysis (RTA). Four themes emerged: Formative Influences (childhood experiences and gifted family members), (Inter)Subjective Paranormal Experience (transcendental/mystic encounters and ESP), Embodied Processes (sense of control over abilities), and Perception of Reality (self-awareness and surreal perceptions). These themes mapped onto lifeworld fractions of temporality, inter-subjectivity, embodiment, and spatiality. Self-ascription operates as an attributional process where individuals construct coherent narratives to contextualize and validate their claimed powers, with belief reciprocally reinforcing paranormal interpretation of anomalous experiences.
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📋 Cite this paper
Drinkwater, Kenneth Graham, Dagnall, Neil, Walsh, Stephen, Sproson, Lisa, Peverell, Matthew, Denovan, Andrew (2022). Self-Ascribed Paranormal Ability: Reflexive Thematic Analysis. Frontiers in Psychology. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.845283
@article{drinkwater_2022_self_ascribed_paranormal,
title = {Self-Ascribed Paranormal Ability: Reflexive Thematic Analysis},
author = {Drinkwater, Kenneth Graham and Dagnall, Neil and Walsh, Stephen and Sproson, Lisa and Peverell, Matthew and Denovan, Andrew},
year = {2022},
journal = {Frontiers in Psychology},
doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2022.845283},
}