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Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research
molysis data of the present experiment for normality, found that their his-
tograms
looked
relatively bell-shaped and
that nonparametric Mann-
Whitney U
tests calculated
for the 32 subjects yielded results virtually
identical to those of the t tests reported above (scoring rates were indepen-
dently significant for 9 of the 32 individuals). She concluded that the
t
tests were valid (assuming the scores were independent).
Discussion
As expected, within- and between-subjects variability in this formal ex-
periment was greatly reduced by the changes in experimental protocol that
resulted from observations made
in the pilot and intermediate phase ex-
periments. This reduction in the experiment’s “noise” level permitted the
observation here of psi effects that could not be detected in the pilot study.
Significant differences
in rate of hemolysis between experimental
(i.e.,
mentally “protected”) and control blood samples were found in an extra-
chance number of subjects.
It may be possible to discover important differences between subjects
who exhibited significant positive scoring and those who exhibited signifi-
cant negative scoring or chance scoring through detailed psychological
analyses that would consider both short-term (“state”) and more persis-
tent (“trait”) characteristics of the subjects.
State analyses could focus
upon the types of mental strategies used by the subjects in their attempts
to influence the target cells. Some subjects, for example, employed a di-
rect
strategy of visualizing the blood
cells
in a very
realistic manner,
whereas other subjects employed a more indirect strategy of visualizing
objects that were similar to the blood cells and possessed characteristics
similar to those that protected cells might possess. Are more direct strate-
gies more effective than indirect strategies based upon associations and
symbolic representations? Trait analyses could be accomplished by asking
all participants of the formal study to return to the laboratory for various
personality assessments. Such assessments would, of course, be carried
out by laboratory personnel who are blind to the subjects’ hemolysis re-
sults. Initial assessments might involve psychological instruments such as
the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and die Participant Information Form,
which have already been shown to correlate with other types of psi perfor-
mance (e.g., Berger, Schechter, & Honorton,
1985; Honorton, Barker,
Varvoglis,
Berger, &
Schechter,
1985).
Possible
interactions between
state and trait factors could also be examined.
In the present study, several factors may have interfered with the emer-
gence of even stronger psi effects. These factors were: (a) the presence of
relatively large individual differences in the characteristics of the subjects,
(b) the long durations of the psi “effort” periods and of the experimental
sessions as a whole, and (c) the absence of real-time feedback to the sub-
jects concerning the state of the target system. Factor (a) could be mini-
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Distant Mental Influence of Hemolysis Rate
mized in future studies by more stringent selection of participants in terms
of prior histories of successful bio-PK performance and of personality
characteristics known to be correlated with psi performance. Factors (b)
and (c) were necessitated by the “tube number’’ component of the present
design
(i.e., the assessment of two versus eight tubes in each 15-minute
protect or control period). Lengthy “effort” periods were required to ac-
commodate the measurement of eight tubes, and the requirement of
keeping the subject “blind” to the number of tubes prevented the admin-
istration of feedback because that would have allowed the subject to keep
track of the number of tubes measured. Future experiments unconcerned
with a tube-number factor could include briefer psi-influence periods and
could also provide feedback. It should be noted, however, that there exists
a growing body of evidence that suggests that real-time sensory feedback
to the subjects is not a necessary condition for the occurrence of strong psi
effects (e.g., Berger, 1988; Braud, 1978b).
The major purpose of the present study was to determine whether a
significant psi effect involving hemolysis could be observed using a large
number of unselected subjects and an improved experimental protocol.
The extrachance number of independently
significant subject perfor-
mances provides an affirmative answer to this question. One of two sec-
ondary goals of the study was to explore the issue of whether an IDS
interpretation or an RA interpretation provides a better explanation of the
results. (The other secondary goal was to study the “own” versus “an-
other’s” blood cells factor.) According to an RA interpretation, the sub-
jects (or the experimenter) actually retard hemolysis rate in a causal or
quasi-causal manner, yielding values that would not have occurred in the
absence of influence attempts. According to an IDS
interpretation, the
experimental personnel take advantage of already existing fluctuations of
hemolysis rate among different blood samples, “sorting” those values by
the scheduling and timing of their trials so as to produce an effect that
simulates a causal effect.
It is important to remember that an IDS effect is
still a psi effect, but an informational rather than a causal one.
There were several opportunities for intuitive data sorting in the present
experiment. The person (M.S.) who provided the random schedule for
blood source, tube condition, and tube number used a fixed rule that in-
volved converting published weather information into an entry point for a
table of random numbers. However, arbitrary decisions were still possible
in assigning odd or even digits to the various sources, conditions, and tube
numbers, and such decisions by M.S. provided possible entry points for
IDS
that could influence both between- and within-subject effects. A
second possible source of sorting involved subject scheduling for the ini-
tial blood-drawing
sessions. Which
subjects happened
to
arrive
at the
laboratory on a given Monday evening for blood drawing would determine
their places or positions
in
the
test schedule, and hence the particular
blood samples that would be assigned to them; this could provide addi-
tional IDS entry points. Subject-scheduling IDS effects could be mediated
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