Overview

Thomas Rabeyron has established himself as a leading researcher in the clinical and experimental study of anomalous experiences, uncommon psychological phenomena that people typically interpret as paranormal. His work is distinctive in bridging three traditionally separate domains: clinical psychology and psychotherapy, cognitive neuroscience, and experimental parapsychology. Rather than treating anomalous experiences as pathological symptoms to be eliminated, Rabeyron has developed a framework for understanding them as meaningful psychological processes that emerge under specific conditions, particularly in response to trauma and negative life events.

His research has been characterized by methodological rigor and international collaboration. He has been a co-author on major meta-analytic syntheses of precognition experiments, a contributor to functional neuroimaging studies investigating the neural correlates of psi phenomena, and a clinical researcher documenting how anomalous experiences present in therapeutic settings. This combination of roles (experimental collaborator, meta-analyst, and clinician) has positioned him as a bridge figure in parapsychology, capable of translating between laboratory findings and real-world clinical contexts.

Life and career

Rabeyron trained as a clinical psychologist and has maintained affiliations with both French and British universities throughout his career. His early work focused on the intersection of psychology and exceptional experiences, establishing him as a researcher interested in phenomena that mainstream psychology often marginalizes. He became affiliated with the University of Nantes in France and later held positions at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, allowing him to participate in international research networks.

His entry into parapsychology research came through collaboration with established figures in the field. He became a frequent co-author with Daryl Bem, the Cornell psychologist whose 2011 precognition experiments sparked both significant interest and methodological debate in psychology. This collaboration led to his involvement in the 2015–2016 meta-analysis of precognition experiments, which became one of the most comprehensive syntheses of this research domain. Simultaneously, he developed an independent research program focused on the clinical and psychological dimensions of anomalous experiences, publishing work that examined their relationship to trauma, mental health, and altered states of consciousness.

Rabeyron’s career reflects a deliberate strategy of working across institutional and national boundaries. His dual affiliations in France and the United Kingdom, combined with his collaborations with researchers in Italy, the United States, and other countries, have made him a central node in international parapsychology research networks. He has contributed to proceedings of the Parapsychological Society and has been involved in organizing and participating in multi-laboratory replication studies that test the robustness of controversial psi findings.

Research

Precognition and meta-analysis

Rabeyron’s most visible contribution to parapsychology has been his role as co-author of the meta-analysis “Feeling the future,” which synthesized 90 experiments on anomalous anticipation conducted across 33 laboratories in 14 countries. The meta-analysis examined whether individuals’ cognitive and affective responses could be influenced by randomly selected stimulus events that occurred after the responses had already been recorded, a phenomenon traditionally called precognition.¹

The meta-analysis reported an overall effect of z = 6.40, p = 1.2 × 10⁻¹⁰, with an effect size (Hedges’ g) of 0.09. When the original experiments by Bem were excluded, independent replications yielded a combined effect size of 0.06, z = 4.16, p = 1.1 × 10⁻⁵, with a Bayes Factor of 3,853, exceeding the criterion for “decisive evidence” in Bayesian terms. The analysis also examined potential sources of bias, finding that seven of eight statistical tests supported the conclusion that the database was not significantly compromised by selection bias or p-hacking. P-curve analysis estimated the true effect size to be 0.20 for the complete database and 0.24 for independent replications.¹

This work positioned Rabeyron at the center of contemporary debates about precognition research. The meta-analysis provided quantitative support for the existence of small but persistent effects in precognition experiments, while simultaneously acknowledging the controversial status of these findings and the ongoing debate about their explanation.

Anomalous experiences, trauma, and symbolization

Parallel to his meta-analytic work, Rabeyron developed a clinical research program examining anomalous experiences in therapeutic contexts. In collaboration with Tianna Loose, he published a comprehensive review of anomalous experiences from the perspective of both psychoanalysis and cognitive neuroscience. The work defined anomalous experiences as “uncommon experiences which are usually interpreted as being paranormal by those who report them,” and argued that current progress in cognitive neuroscience and psychoanalysis could illuminate the contexts in which they emerge and their underlying processes.²

A central finding of this research was that anomalous experiences frequently occur as specific reactions to negative life events, often taking the form of non-pathological hallucinations. Rather than viewing these experiences as symptoms of psychiatric disorder, Rabeyron and Loose proposed understanding them as primary forms of symbolization and transformation of subjective experience, particularly during or after traumatic situations. The research examined three main lines of evidence: the links between anomalous experiences and hallucinatory processes; the traumatic aspects of these experiences and the altered states of consciousness they involve; and the role of increased psychic permeability, a hypersensitivity that may underlie their emergence.²

This framework represented a significant departure from traditional psychiatric approaches that pathologize anomalous experiences. Instead, Rabeyron positioned them as potentially adaptive psychological processes that warrant clinical understanding rather than suppression. The work drew on clinical cases from a service specializing in anomalous experiences, grounding the theoretical framework in actual therapeutic encounters.

Mental health, personality, and anomalous experiences

Rabeyron’s early work with Caroline Watt examined the relationship between paranormal experiences, mental health, and personality factors. Their research investigated how mental boundaries, the psychological capacity to distinguish between self and other, internal and external, relate to both anomalous experiences and psi performance. The work demonstrated correlations between personality variables, mental health outcomes, and the frequency and nature of reported anomalous experiences, suggesting that individual differences in psychological structure influence susceptibility to and interpretation of these phenomena.⁴

Neuroimaging and psi

Rabeyron contributed to theoretical and methodological discussions about the use of functional neuroimaging to investigate psi phenomena. In collaboration with David Acunzo and Renaud Evrard, he examined the rationale and challenges of using brain imaging to test whether psi-related processes are observable in neural activity. The work reviewed attempts to test the psi hypothesis using functional neuroimaging, examining studies that investigated telepathy, distant intentionality, and precognition. The authors noted that while most studies reported results consistent with the psi hypothesis, several suffered from methodological limitations that warranted careful interpretation.³

This contribution positioned Rabeyron as a thoughtful critic of neuroimaging approaches to psi, capable of evaluating both the promise and the pitfalls of using brain imaging to investigate anomalous phenomena.

Quantum measurement and pragmatic information

More recently, Rabeyron has engaged with theoretical frameworks attempting to reconcile quantum physics with psi phenomena. In collaboration with Markus Maier and Moritz Dechamps, he contributed to research conceptualizing quantum measurement as pragmatic information transfer. This work tested whether intentional observation influences quantum-based stochastic outcomes, with results suggesting that observer-dependent biases in quantum outcomes depend on the level of scientific objectivity applied in measurement. The research proposed the existence of a “sobjective” reality (occupying the space between subjectivity and objectivity) as a framework for understanding how intentional agents might influence physical outcomes.⁷

International replication studies

Rabeyron has been an active participant in multi-laboratory replication studies testing controversial psi findings. He contributed to a large international collaboration led by Marilyn Schlitz and Daryl Bem that sought to replicate precognition effects using a time-reversed priming task. The study involved experimenters from multiple countries and tested whether response times to incongruent stimuli would be longer than response times to congruent stimuli even though the prime had not yet appeared. While the preregistered confirmatory hypothesis was not supported, exploratory analyses revealed that participants completing the English-language version showed effects consistent with the original study, whereas non-English translations did not. A second experiment tested whether pro-psi and anti-psi statements would influence effect size, with mixed results.⁵

Rabeyron also participated in a preregistered multi-laboratory replication of retroactive avoidance experiments, testing whether future aversive stimuli could influence past behavioral responses. This high-powered study (N = 2004) across multiple laboratories found evidence favoring the null effect, with a Bayes Factor of 4.38, questioning the robustness of the original findings.⁶

Influence and reception

Rabeyron’s influence in parapsychology has grown substantially through his role in major meta-analytic syntheses and his participation in international replication networks. The “Feeling the future” meta-analysis has become a key reference point in debates about precognition research, cited by both proponents and skeptics of psi phenomena. His work has helped establish standards for how precognition experiments should be evaluated and synthesized across laboratories.

His clinical research on anomalous experiences has opened new avenues for understanding these phenomena within psychology and psychiatry. By framing anomalous experiences as potentially adaptive responses to trauma rather than pathological symptoms, he has influenced how clinicians and researchers approach these phenomena in therapeutic settings. His work has been published in mainstream psychology and neuroscience journals, lending credibility to parapsychology research within the broader scientific community.

Rabeyron’s participation in multi-laboratory replication studies reflects his commitment to methodological rigor and transparency in controversial science. His willingness to contribute to studies that test and sometimes fail to replicate precognition effects demonstrates a commitment to scientific integrity over advocacy. This approach has positioned him as a trusted figure capable of conducting rigorous research on controversial topics.

His theoretical work on quantum measurement and pragmatic information transfer has engaged with contemporary physics and philosophy of science, attempting to develop frameworks that might accommodate psi phenomena within broader scientific understanding. While these theoretical contributions remain speculative, they reflect an effort to move parapsychology beyond purely empirical demonstrations toward theoretical integration.

Rabeyron’s career exemplifies a contemporary approach to parapsychology research: international collaboration, methodological sophistication, engagement with mainstream science, and willingness to test controversial claims through rigorous replication. His work has helped establish parapsychology as a field capable of conducting sophisticated meta-analyses, participating in multi-laboratory studies, and contributing to theoretical discussions in neuroscience and psychology.