Future directions in precognition research: more research can bridge the gap between skeptics and proponents.

Abstract

Although claims of precognition have been prevalent across human history, it is no surprise that these assertions have been met with strong skepticism. Precognition, the ability to obtain information about a future event, unknowable through inference alone, before the event actually occurs, conflicts with the fundamental subjective experience of time asymmetrically flowing from past to future, brings into question the notion of free will, and contends with steadfast notions of cause and effect. Despite these reasons for skepticism, researchers have pursued this topic, and a large database of studies conducted under controlled laboratory conditions now exist. This work roughly spans from the 1930's (e.g., Rhine, 1938) up to this day (Bem, 2011; Mossbridge et al., 2014; Rabeyron, 2014). The accumulated evidence includes significant meta-analyses of forced-choice guessing experiments (Honorton and Ferrari, 1989), presentiment experiments (Mossbridge et al., 2012), and recent replications from Bem (2011, discussed below; Bem et al., 2014). Perhaps most central to the recent debate regarding the existence of precognition is work by Bem (2011). Bem (2011) time-reversed several classic psychology effects (e.g., studying after instead of before a test; being primed after, instead of before responding) and found evidence across nine experiments supporting precognition. Given the sound methodology and publication at a high-impact mainstream psychology journal, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, this work has prompted the attention of psychologists; and, not surprisingly, the response has been skeptical (Rouder and Morey, 2011; Wagenmakers et al., 2011). While we acknowledge skepticism and close scrutiny is vital in reaching consensus on this topic, given the equivocation surrounding the results, we propose that more research is needed. In particular, we suggest that applied research designs that allow for the prediction of meaningful events ahead of time can move this debate forward. Since it is not obvious how experiments that do not require explicit “guessing” of future events could be used for this goal, we give a general overview of two methodologies designed toward this aim.