Examining Psychokinesis: The Interaction of Human Intention With Random Number Generators—A Meta-Analysis
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Plain English Summary
Can you move things with your mind? This landmark meta-analysis, published in one of psychology's most prestigious journals, tackled that question head-on by crunching 380 studies spanning 45 years of people trying to mentally influence random number generators (basically digital coin flips). The verdict? There is a statistically significant effect — but it's breathtakingly tiny, shifting the odds to 50.0286% instead of a perfect 50/50. That's like winning one extra coin flip out of every 3,500. And here's the kicker: smaller studies found bigger effects, which is a classic red flag for publication bias (the tendency for boring null results to stay in file drawers). The researchers ran a clever computer simulation showing that if roughly 1,500 unpublished negative studies existed, it would perfectly reproduce all the patterns in the data. Their blunt conclusion borrowed a phrase from 1962: "not proven." This analysis became the single strongest skeptical challenge to the entire mind-over-matter research program and sparked a heated rebuttal from the field's leading proponents.
Actual Paper Abstract
Se´ance-room and other large-scale psychokinetic phenomena have fascinated humankind for decades. Experimental research has reduced these phenomena to attempts to influence (a) the fall of dice and, later, (b) the output of random number generators (RNGs). The meta-analysis combined 380 studies that assessed whether RNG output correlated with human intention and found a significant but very small overall effect size. The study effect sizes were strongly and inversely related to sample size and were extremely heterogeneous. A Monte Carlo simulation revealed that the small effect size, the relation between sample size and effect size, and the extreme effect size heterogeneity found could in principle be a result of publication bias.
Research Notes
The most rigorous independent meta-analysis of the RNG-PK database, published in the APA’s Psychological Bulletin. Its Monte Carlo publication bias simulation provides the strongest skeptical argument against the entire RNG-PK evidence base and directly prompted Radin, Nelson, Dobyns & Houtkooper’s rebuttal. Essential reading for Controversies 4 (PK) and 10 (meta-debate).
A meta-analysis of 380 studies (117 reports, 1959–2004) examining whether human intention can influence true random number generator output. Using both fixed-effects and random-effects models, the analysis found a statistically significant but extremely small overall effect (REM: π = .500286, z = 4.08, p < .001, excluding three outlier studies). However, effect sizes were inversely related to sample size (small-study effect) and extremely heterogeneous (Q = 1508.56, p ≈ 0). A Monte Carlo simulation showed that a simple publication bias model could reproduce all three main findings, requiring approximately 1,500 unpublished null studies. The authors conclude with Girden’s 1962 verdict: “not proven.”
Links
Related Papers
Critiques
- Evidence for Consciousness-Related Anomalies in Random Physical Systems — Radin, Dean I (1989)
- Effects of Consciousness on the Fall of Dice: A Meta-Analysis — Radin, Dean I (1991)
- The PEAR Proposition — Jahn, Robert G (2005)
- Engineering Anomalies Research — Jahn, Robert G (1987)
- The Persistent Paradox of Psychic Phenomena: An Engineering Perspective — Jahn, Robert G (1982)
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- Observer Effects on Quantum Randomness: Testing Micro-Psychokinetic Effects of Smokers on Addiction-Related Stimuli — Maier, Markus A (2018)
- Assessing the Evidence for Mind-Matter Interaction Effects — Radin, Dean (2006)
- Can Parapsychology Move Beyond the Controversies of Retrospective Meta-Analyses? — Kennedy, J.E (2013)
- Evidence for Anomalistic Correlations Between Human Behavior and a Random Event Generator: Result of an Independent Replication of a Micro-PK Experiment — Walach, Harald (2020)
- The Experimental Evidence for Parapsychological Phenomena: A Review — Cardeña, Etzel (2018)
- Quantum Aspects of the Brain-Mind Relationship: A Hypothesis with Supporting Evidence — Kauffman, Stuart A (2023)
- Parapsychological Phenomena as Examples of Generalized Nonlocal Correlations—A Theoretical Framework — Walach, Harald (2014)
- A Call for an Open, Informed Study of All Aspects of Consciousness — Cardeña, Etzel (2014)
- Testing Nonlocal Observation as a Source of Intuitive Knowledge — Radin, Dean (2008)
- Entertaining Without Endorsing: The Case for the Scientific Investigation of Anomalous Cognition — Schooler, Jonathan W (2018)
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📋 Cite this paper
Bösch, Holger, Steinkamp, Fiona, Boller, Emil (2006). Examining Psychokinesis: The Interaction of Human Intention With Random Number Generators—A Meta-Analysis. Psychological Bulletin. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.132.4.497
@article{bosch_2006_examining,
title = {Examining Psychokinesis: The Interaction of Human Intention With Random Number Generators—A Meta-Analysis},
author = {Bösch, Holger and Steinkamp, Fiona and Boller, Emil},
year = {2006},
journal = {Psychological Bulletin},
doi = {10.1037/0033-2909.132.4.497},
}