Approved For Release 2000/08/08). G1AsRDPY96 -00789R002200650001 -6 jpanvensineneneenennmmeasnss ; Enhancing Human Performance The committee reviewed individual and intrapsychic approaches to stress reduction, including arousal reduc- tion (relaxation training and biofeedback), cognitive re- structuring and problem solving. and behavioral skills training. Regarding biofeedback, on which 4 conclusion was specifically requested of the committee, it was found that although biofeedback can achieve a reduction of muscle tension. it does not reduce stress effectively. Committee members’ appreciation of military stress was enhanced by a visit to Fort Benning, Georgia, where they viewed paratroop training (and arranged. and then mercifully aborted, an opportunity for David Goslin to make a jump). They saw Bradley vehicles maneuvering under fire and then rode in one. They also heard a pre- sentation and viewed a videotape on the extraordinarily demanding and stressful procedures of Ranger training, which centers on several weeks of long daily marches over difficult and hazardous terrains under severe envi- ronmental conditions. Influence Strategies The committee’s treatment of strategies of social in- fluence centered on neurolinguistic programming (NLP). NLP's wide use in the army was described by army rep- resentative Robert Klaus in two briefings; a background paper by Pruitt, Crocker, and Hanes was recruited by the committee (footnote 2); and Singer, Davison. Mobley, and Druckmann attended a workshop on NLP techniques and interviewed Richard Bandler, one of the developers of NLP. The conclusion was that little if any evidence exists either to support NLP’s assumptions of to indicate that it is effective as a strategy for social influence. NLP has also been used as a means to model expert ’ performance and the commiltee’s visit lo Fort Benning included a review of a test of this aspect of NLP as ap- plied to marksmanship. Though the committee could find only one evaluation of NLP as a model of expert perfor- mance. and found that one wanting, it did conclude that the investigation of expert models ¢ nslitutes: a worth- while activity for the army, and the¢continuing committee plans to pursue that topic. Group Cohesion The army is quite committed to developing group co- hesion. Its current COHORT system of keeping units intact is motivated by the. desire to enhance group per formance by increasing group cohesion. The chair of the committee’s resource advisory group, Lieutenant Gen- eral Robert M. Elton, and the commander of the Army Research Institute. Colonel William Darryl Henderson, have written in support of it (Elton, 1984: Henderson. 1985). A technical report from the Walter Reed Army institute for Research points out that civilian scholars as hibits breakdown, without regard to the research com: | munity’s ability to demonstrate relationships ('The New Manning System Field Evaluation,” 1986, No. 3, p. 9. Peters and Waterman's In Search of Excellence (982) may represent civilian scholars in this regard, and indeed. | the research community has been supportive to a degree ; (e.g., Campbell, 1975; Katz & Kahn, 1966). The committee, however, believed that the arguments in favor ought to be treated as hypotheses rather than conclusions, citing difficulties in separating conse quences and indicators of cohesion, the gap between im- proved cohesion and better unit performance, the ten- dency to rely on single-factor explanations of group performance, and the possibility of reciprocal effects be- tween cohesion and performance. The current evidence makes it necessary for organizations seeking to benefit from cohesion to proceed largely on faith; the committee referred to some possible negative consequences of co- | hesjon as reviewed by Porter, Lawler, and Hackman (1975); ineffective handling of deviance, “group think,” inereased impact of any existing negative norms, and increased intergroup conflict. The committee also dhs- cussed issues of implementation that it saw as having received little attention. A background paper by Tamir and Kunda (footnote 2) developed implications from the | cultural perspective advanced by Schein (1985). Parapsychology ‘The subcommittee on parapsychology made its prine | Princeton University and Helmut Schmidt in San Anto: | of randum event generators. Eaperunents ua remele | viewing were also discussed at Princeton. Hyman and | Humphreys were joined on both visits by Dr. Paul Hor witz, a consultant to the committee and a physicist ai: co eee . Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., who had organized a 1979 symposium on “‘Physics and Parapsychology,’ for . the American Physical Society that included as speakers | Helmut Schmidt and Ray Hyman. Also visiting Professor ! Jahn were Druckman7 Lawrence, and Paul Holland, ther | 4 member of the committee. Hyman visited Edward May at the Stanford Research Institute to discuss experiments on random event generators and remote viewing. Hyman | and Horwitz were briefed by representatives of the U.S. | Army Laboratory Command on parapsychology and mil itary intelligence; Druckman and Swets were briefed an Soviet parapsychology by representatives of the Army Foreign Science and Technology Center and the Defense | Intelligence Agency. In connection with a meeting heldin: San Diego, the entire committee, kindly accompanied by ' local psychology professors George Mandler and William well as senior military officers accept that cohesion in- 90 Approved For Release 2000/08/08 : CIA-RDP96-00789R002200650001-6 ! McGill, visited the laboratory of Cleve Backster who sug: ppaiannn ne VOL. 1, NO. 2, MARCH! ~ cipal site visits to the laboratories of Robert Jahn at__- nio to discuss experiments On the psychokinetic control , , vO
com- New p. 9). 1982) deed, egree nents than pnse- nim- : ten- yroup ts be- jJence enefit nittee of co- kman ink," . and > dis- waving Tamir m the prin- bn at Anto- antrol smote n and | Hor- sist at zed a a for ‘iam 10 Sug- Approved For Release 2000/08/08 ‘CIA-RDP$6-00789R002200650001-6 a | John A. Swets und Robert A. Bjork fod | gests that the electrical activity of a preparation of leu- | kocytes taken from the mouth of a human subject re- * sponds to the emotional states of the subject, al a later time and in a different place. For this visit, the promise to , the committee. not_fulfilled, was an observable demon- | Isration of anomalous events. jtow subjects sit in front of one of three kinds of random event generators and attempt to affect the behavior of the device in one of three ways: In the PK + mode, the sub- ject tries to get a higher than chance level of hits; in PK - node, a lower than chance level: and in baseline mode, a mmber of hits equal to the chance level. Under volitional ~onditions, the subject is free to select among the three |modes: under instructed conditions, he or she is not. \ Horwitz observed that the investigators reported no dif- iftrences in results occasioned by a transition from a (rue a random event generator (an analogue electronic device or | | amechanical device) to 4 pseudorandom event generator | ‘adigital, programmed device) that is actually determin- | istic and nonrandom. They believed that their subjects could will changes in a voltage or voltage threshold of a noise source or changes in the trajectories of small balls ( | | || i lin to right: Davison, Bjork, Posner, Hyman. Schneide phreys, Thompson, Springer. and Singer. Visitors to Professor Jahn's laboratory were shown | falling down a chute with multiple obstacles and, equally | well, changes in certain bits (from zeros to ones or vice versa) of predetermined and otherwise completely repro- ducible sequences as generated by an array of shift reg- igters. At his Mind Science Foundation in San Antonio, Dr. Schmidt described an expenment designed to permit 2 skeptical group of scientists to apply adequate controls to | a psychokinesis experiment without destroying the psy- chological environment fora subject that is said by psi aH groups Use a plece of data nol yet availabe (¢.g., specified weather data from the New York Times at some agreed upon future date) as a pointer into a given table of random numbers, which will generate ‘seed numbers” to a pseudorandom number generator and hence produce a predetermined sequence of ones and zeros. Both groups follow a set procedure to assign PK + und PK — modes to the seed numbers and thereby instructions for the sub- ject. An agreement made during the site visit to conduct ajoint experiment with Dr. Horwitz as participant, which would be monitored by the committee, was not followed up by Dr. Schmidt. TT ecomimittee benefited from a review of the litera- ture on remote viewing and random event generators pre- “ Ud UL 2, 8, Au r, Swets, Landers, Mobley. Porter. Druckman, Hum- ot Approved For Release 2000/08/08 : CIA-RDP96-00789R002200650001-6