Discovery Lab Answers

Alan Gauld — Experiments and Data

The sources retrieved for this question are primarily Gauld’s published essays, book reviews, and scholarly reflections rather than reports of original experiments Gauld himself conducted. That said, they do illuminate his empirical contributions, his analytical methods, and the research traditions he engaged with most deeply. Here is what the sources support, organized by area.

Poltergeist Case Survey (Gauld & Cornell 1979)

The most substantial piece of original data-collection documented in the retrieved sources is the large-scale survey Gauld conducted with A. D. Cornell, published as Poltergeists (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979). The ESP-Nexus Poltergeist Cases page draws on this directly: the survey covered 500 poltergeist cases and tabulated the frequency of reported phenomena. Small objects moving was the most commonly reported effect (64% of cases), followed by rapping sounds (48%), and large objects moving (36%). A human apparition was reported in 29% of the sample. The majority of cases in the survey had no confirmed normal explanation, and only 41 cases (roughly 8%) were classified as confirmed fraud [source: ESP-Nexus Poltergeist Cases page, citing Gauld & Cornell 1979].

This was a systematic content analysis of historical and contemporary case records rather than a laboratory experiment — Gauld’s characteristic method was forensic and archival, examining primary documents and cross-checking witness testimony rather than running controlled trials.

The book review in ^[1] adds a revealing methodological detail: when Michael Hunter later examined the Mompesson documents Gauld had reproduced in Gauld and Cornell (1979), Hunter accused Gauld of omitting significant passages — totaling approximately 70 lines plus stray sentences. Gauld acknowledged the omissions and stated they were made to save space, arguing the omitted material added little to the overall analysis ^[1]. This exchange illustrates the standard Gauld held himself to in documentary case work: working from primary archival sources and accepting accountability for what was included or excluded.

Mediumship Research: Analytical Framework, Not Personal Lab Data

Gauld’s engagement with mediumship was primarily evaluative and theoretical rather than experimental. In his essay review ^[3], he laid out in precise terms the logical structure of the competing hypotheses — survival vs. what he called the “living-agent psi” (LAP) hypothesis — and assessed what kinds of evidence would be most diagnostic. He identified the category of evidence he found most troubling for the survival hypothesis: cases in which information known only to the living sitter (rather than to the deceased communicator) appears in the communication, which would favor LAP over survival ^[3].

He reviewed a body of mediumship experiments described in ^[2] involving 15 “research-oriented” mental mediums and approximately 50 “research-oriented” sitters, using both single-blinded (medium blind to sitter identity) and double-blinded designs (sitters additionally blind to medium identity), across experimental designs extending over a decade and a half. The retrieved passage does not include the statistical outcomes of those experiments — it is a book review rather than the primary report — so no figures can be stated here ^[2]. The retrieved excerpt does not contain them, and the original primary reports would need to be consulted for effect sizes and significance levels.

Reincarnation Research: Stevenson’s Work Evaluated

Gauld wrote a detailed reflective assessment of Ian Stevenson’s case-collection methodology and data ^[4]. His analysis was not of his own experiments but of Stevenson’s approach — which Gauld described as one of the most remarkable research careers of its time. He outlined Stevenson’s method: locating children who claimed memories of previous lives, documenting their statements before verification, then tracing whether those statements matched a deceased person unknown to the child’s family.

Gauld provided a specific illustrative case: a child who gave the name Dharshana, described being called “Baby Mahattaya,” named an older sister as Malkanthie, an uncle as Premasiri, described a family uncle as a mudalili (successful businessman), an aunt who cooked chilies, named the family house “Buwan,” and described having “left his foot” ^[4]. Gauld’s function here was critical evaluation — he assessed what the accumulated case data could and could not establish, and he defended Stevenson against what he characterized as misrepresentations in critical commentary (specifically that a critic had falsely combined Stevenson’s own speculations with criticisms as though both were Stevenson’s) ^[4].

PK Literature: Review and Assessment

In ^[5], Gauld reviewed Pamela Rae Heath’s cross-cultural survey of psychokinesis (PK) literature. His affiliation at this time is given in the source as School of Psychology, University of Nottingham ^[5]. The review covered a work organized in three parts examining anecdotal PK evidence across cultures. The retrieved excerpt does not extend far enough to report Gauld’s specific conclusions about that literature’s evidential weight.

Historical and Conceptual Work

Gauld’s review of Michael Hunter’s The Decline of Magic ^[1] engages with the historical epistemology of psychical research in the Enlightenment period, including early documented cases such as the Mompesson/Drummer of Tedworth case. This situates his empirical work within a longer tradition: he was concerned not only with collecting and analyzing case data but with understanding how such cases were documented, suppressed, or distorted in the historical record.

Skeptical Critiques

What critics argue. Michael Hunter’s The Decline of Magic (2020) raised a specific textual criticism: that in Gauld and Cornell (1979), Gauld had omitted approximately 70 lines plus additional sentences from relevant Mompesson documents when reproducing them, and that these omissions were significant ^[1].

What the experimental data show. Gauld acknowledged the omissions directly and offered his rationale: the passages were cut to save space and, in his judgment, added little to the overall analysis ^[1]. The criticism is about documentary completeness in a historical case study, not about experimental fraud or fabrication of data.

Analysis. The exchange between Hunter and Gauld illustrates a tension that runs through case-survey research: where the investigator’s editorial judgment in reproducing historical documents shapes what readers can assess. Hunter published the criticism; Gauld responded with an explanation. Whether the omitted 70 lines would have materially altered the analysis is a question the retrieved sources do not resolve, and independent assessment of those specific documents would be required to settle it.

The Poltergeist Cases and Super-Psi Hypothesis pages on ESP-Nexus carry the site’s fuller synthesis of the research traditions Gauld contributed to most centrally.