Overview

Callum E. Cooper has emerged as a leading researcher in the phenomenology and psychological impact of spontaneous after-death communication (ADC) experiences. His work bridges parapsychology, thanatology, and bereavement psychology, examining both the nature of ADC experiences and their role in grief recovery. Cooper has also contributed to experimental psi research, particularly in the application of ganzfeld stimulation to remote viewing protocols. His research is characterized by rigorous methodology, large-scale survey work, and collaborative international studies that situate anomalous experiences within the broader context of human psychology and the grieving process.

Cooper’s career reflects a dual commitment to understanding spontaneous psi phenomena in naturalistic settings and to advancing controlled experimental protocols. He has published extensively on anomalous telephone calls, the phenomenology of ADC experiences, and the therapeutic dimensions of perceived contact with the deceased. His work has consistently emphasized the need for healthcare workers, counselors, and the general public to understand and accept ADC experiences as a normal part of bereavement rather than pathology.

Life and career

Cooper completed his doctoral studies at the University of Northampton, where his research focused on thanatology, positive psychology, and anomalous experiences. He also pursued postgraduate training at Manchester Metropolitan University with emphasis on parapsychology and spontaneous case methodology. He is currently a lecturer in psychology at the University of Northampton, where he leads research on the intersection of bereavement, anomalous experiences, and psychological well-being.

Throughout his career, Cooper has been active in professional parapsychology organizations, holding membership in the Society for Psychical Research, the Parapsychological Association, and the British Psychological Society. His institutional affiliations have positioned him at the center of contemporary parapsychology research in the United Kingdom, where he has collaborated with leading researchers including Chris A. Roe and international colleagues including Evelyn Elsaesser, David Lorimer, and Jennifer K. Penberthy.

Cooper’s early research focused on anomalous telephone phenomena and after-death communication, areas that had received limited academic attention since the foundational work of D. Scott Rogo and Raymond Bayless in the 1970s. He revived and expanded this research through systematic analysis of accounts and peer-reviewed publication, establishing a contemporary research base for understanding anomalous electronic and spontaneous communication experiences.⁴

His research program has progressively expanded to encompass large-scale phenomenological surveys, collaborative international studies on ADC experiences and their psychological impacts, and experimental work on psi-conducive states. This trajectory reflects a commitment to understanding anomalous experiences both as they occur naturally in human life and as they can be investigated under controlled laboratory conditions.

Research

After-Death Communication Phenomenology

Cooper’s most substantial body of work concerns the phenomenology and psychological impact of spontaneous after-death communication experiences. In collaboration with Evelyn Elsaesser, Chris A. Roe, and David Lorimer, he has conducted large-scale survey research examining the nature of ADC experiences and their role in bereavement and grief recovery.

A landmark study analyzed 991 viable cases from a detailed questionnaire investigating the phenomenology of spontaneous ADCs.¹ The research characterized the sensory distribution of ADC experiences, finding that 46% were visual, 44% auditory, 48% involved touch, and 28% involved olfactory perception, with 34% of respondents reporting a sense of presence of the deceased without input from the five senses. Importantly, a majority of respondents reported that ADCs were distinctly different from simple thoughts about the deceased. The experiences were often perceived as external and possessing properties of the material world (solidity, tactile qualities, and specific spatial location) suggesting compatibility with hypotheses of extrasensory perception or objective phenomena rather than hallucination or imagination.¹

Cooper and colleagues have also examined the psychological and spiritual impacts of ADC experiences. A study of 70 individuals reporting encounters with deceased partners or spouses found that 40% reported accelerated recovery from grief, and 42.9% confirmed that ADCs had a significant influence on their grieving process.² Notably, 47% acknowledged that ADCs eased their acceptance of loss, and 61% expressed a desire for continued contact. The research demonstrated that ADC experiences did not worsen grief-related pain, contrary to assumptions that such experiences might complicate bereavement. Effects on sadness varied: 41% reported no change, while 40% reported reduced sadness.²

Cooper’s research has consistently documented that ADC experiences occur across all demographic groups (age, gender, education level, cultural background, and religious orientation) indicating a universal human phenomenon rather than a culturally specific or psychologically marginal experience.¹ This finding has important implications for clinical practice and bereavement support, suggesting that healthcare workers and counselors should be trained to recognize and validate ADC experiences as a normal part of the grieving process.

In a German-language publication, Cooper and colleagues documented the phenomenology and impacts of spontaneous after-death contacts, presenting research findings and case studies that further characterize the nature and therapeutic dimensions of these experiences.⁵ Additional research has examined what the deceased communicate, what experiencers learn about the deceased’s state of mind, and how these communications impact grief trajectories.⁶

Cooper has also investigated factors that moderate the impact of ADC experiences on beliefs and spirituality, recognizing that the psychological and existential significance of these experiences varies across individuals and contexts.⁷ His work on the phenomenology and psychological impacts of hallucinations concerning the deceased has further clarified the distinction between ADC experiences and pathological hallucinations, contributing to more nuanced clinical understanding.⁸

Experimental Psi Research: Ganzfeld and Remote Viewing

Cooper has contributed to experimental parapsychology research, particularly in the application of ganzfeld stimulation to remote viewing protocols. In a series of three experiments conducted with Chris A. Roe and colleagues at the University of Northampton, he investigated whether ganzfeld stimulation enhanced performance at a precognitive remote viewing task compared to waking conditions.³

The research employed a counterbalanced repeated measures design with 110 total participants. In the ganzfeld stimulation condition, participants achieved 43 hits out of 110 (39%), yielding a highly significant positive deviation from chance expectation (sum of ranks = 225, p = .000012). In contrast, in the waking remote viewing condition, participants achieved 30 hits (27.5%), which was marginally better than chance expectation (sum of ranks = 253, p = .034). The difference in z-scores for target ratings between the two conditions approached significance (t[39] = 1.86, p = .065).³

Analysis of individual difference measures revealed that ganzfeld performance correlated significantly with greater absorption in subjective experience, lower arousal, and less internal dialog, three of twelve sub-dimensions measured using Pekala’s Phenomenology of Consciousness Inventory. These findings suggest that reduced cognitive interference and heightened absorption in the ganzfeld state facilitate psi task success.³ However, in subsequent experiments, individual differences measures including transliminality, openness to experience, and dissociative experiences were unrelated to task success, and PCI dimensions did not consistently correlate with performance across all three experiments, indicating that the relationship between consciousness variables and psi performance requires further investigation.

Cooper has also examined sensory isolation in floatation tanks as a potential method for promoting psi-conducive imagery, exploring alternative approaches to creating altered states conducive to anomalous cognition.⁹

Anomalous Telephone Phenomena and Electronic Communication

Early in his research career, Cooper revived investigation of anomalous telephone calls and electronic communication experiences, a research area that had been largely dormant since the 1970s work of Rogo and Bayless. He conducted systematic analysis of accounts of such phenomena, identifying new areas of historical importance, considering technological advances in relation to modern-day experiences, and providing updated peer review and discussion.⁴ His work established a contemporary research base for understanding anomalous electronic communication as a category of spontaneous psi experience.

Bereavement, Coping, and Anomalous Experiences

Cooper has examined the role of spontaneous post-death phenomena in the natural process of coping and hoping during bereavement.¹⁰ His research has documented the positive impact of anomalous experiences on the bereavement process, contributing to theoretical understanding of how spontaneous psi phenomena may serve adaptive psychological functions.¹¹ He has also investigated spontaneous post-death phenomena and their positive impacts on experiencers, further establishing the therapeutic and existential significance of these experiences.¹²

Beliefs in Life After Death and Assessment Instruments

Cooper has contributed to the development and validation of instruments for assessing beliefs in life after death. In collaboration with Claire Murphy-Morgan and Nick Neave, he developed and assessed a new questionnaire to measure beliefs in life after death, contributing to the methodological infrastructure for studying how anomalous experiences and bereavement influence existential and spiritual beliefs.¹³

Psi in Psychotherapy and Clinical Applications

Cooper has also engaged with the intersection of parapsychology and psychotherapy, contributing a foreword to a work on psi in psychotherapy and the conventional and non-conventional healing of mental illness.¹⁴ This work reflects his broader commitment to integrating parapsychological understanding into clinical and therapeutic contexts.

Exceptional Experiences in Professional Contexts

Cooper has investigated exceptional experiences reported by professionals in the funeral industry, examining how workers in death-related professions encounter and interpret anomalous phenomena.¹⁵ This research extends the study of ADC and related experiences beyond bereaved individuals to professional contexts, broadening understanding of the prevalence and nature of anomalous experiences in death-related work.

Influence and reception

Cooper’s research has contributed significantly to the legitimization and clinical recognition of after-death communication experiences within psychology and bereavement counseling. His large-scale phenomenological studies have provided empirical documentation of the prevalence, characteristics, and psychological impacts of ADC experiences, establishing a research base that challenges pathological interpretations and supports understanding of these experiences as normal aspects of bereavement.

His work has been published in peer-reviewed journals spanning parapsychology, psychology, thanatology, and psychiatry, including the Journal of Parapsychology, the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, Omega, Journal of Death and Dying, and EXPLORE. This interdisciplinary publication record reflects the relevance of his research to multiple academic communities and professional fields.

Cooper’s experimental work on ganzfeld and remote viewing protocols has contributed to contemporary understanding of how altered states of consciousness may facilitate psi performance, building on decades of ganzfeld research while introducing novel methodological refinements. His findings regarding the relationship between absorption, arousal, and internal dialog in ganzfeld performance have implications for understanding the cognitive and phenomenological conditions that support anomalous cognition.

His revival of research on anomalous telephone phenomena has reopened a research area that had been largely abandoned, establishing contemporary methodological and theoretical frameworks for understanding electronic communication experiences as a category of spontaneous psi phenomena. This work demonstrates the value of revisiting historical research areas with updated methods and theoretical perspectives.

Cooper’s collaborative research with international colleagues including Evelyn Elsaesser, Chris A. Roe, David Lorimer, and Jennifer K. Penberthy has established a robust international research program on ADC phenomenology and impacts. The scale and rigor of these collaborative studies (involving hundreds of participants and multiple countries) have set new standards for phenomenological research in parapsychology and thanatology.

His advocacy for training healthcare workers, counselors, and the general public to understand and validate ADC experiences has contributed to broader cultural and professional recognition of these phenomena as normal aspects of human experience rather than pathology. This work has implications for clinical practice, bereavement support, and public understanding of anomalous experiences in the context of grief and loss.