Editorial: Emerging Research: Self-Ascribed Parapsychological Abilities

This editorial signals a fascinating pivot in parapsychology: instead of endlessly debating whether psychic abilities are real, researchers are now asking why so many people report having them and what's going on in their brains and personalities. The collected studies turn up some genuinely surprising connections. People who claim psychic reading abilities show brain patterns resembling synesthesia (where senses blend together) and ASMR (those pleasant tingles from soft sounds). DMT trips and near-death experiences look strikingly alike, complete with encounters with mysterious entities and a dissolving sense of self. Shamans in trance show distinctive brainwave signatures, and meditators light up alertness networks on brain scans. The takeaway: self-described psychic abilities seem tightly linked to heightened sensitivity, altered states of consciousness, and specific cognitive-perceptual personality traits rather than being random delusions.