ESP IN CHILDREN: ITS RELATIONSHIP TO AGE AND PERSONALITY.
Item
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Title
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ESP IN CHILDREN: ITS RELATIONSHIP TO AGE AND PERSONALITY.
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Identifier
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AAI8103962
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identifier
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8103962
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Creator
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SHARGAL, SUSAN K. Y.
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Contributor
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Gertrude R. Schmeidler
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Date
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1980
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Psychology, Clinical
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Abstract
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The relationship between ESP scores and age and a personality measure (the Fisher-Cleveland Body Boundary score) was experimentally investigated using a sample of 115 elementary school children. There was also an exploration of experimenter effect. Children were drawn from the first, third, and fifth grades of a public elementary school and were seen individually by the same person under the same experimental conditions. There were approximately equal numbers from each grade and about half of each sex. Each child was given a variant of the Fisk-West clock card technique (15 targets) and 20 selected cards from Form A of the Holtzman Inkblot Technique (HIT) which were scored for Barrier and Penetration. The clock card ESP test was administered under a GESP paradigm permitting both telepathy and clairvoyance. Although visible to the experimenter, the targets were concealed from the children by a cardboard screen and the children sat eight feet away. About half the children were given feedback after each target, the remainder at the end of the ESP test.;There was a significant decline of ESP scores with age (p = .031) with the first graders scoring suggestively better than the third graders (p = .097) and significantly better than the fifth graders (p = .045). There was no significant difference between the third and fifth graders. The first graders also scored significantly above chance for ESP (p = .025), the third graders at chance, and the fifth graders insignificantly below chance. There was no significant relationship between ESP score and Body Boundary score (Barrier minus Penetration) or Barrier or Penetration score separately. No significant interaction effect was found between age and Body Boundary in relation to ESP. There was no significant difference between the Immediate Feedback and Delayed Feedback groups on ESP scores. None of the experimenter measures or experiment-related variables such as time, date, or order showed a significant relationship with ESP score. Various explanations for the decline in ESP with age were considered and some ideas for future research were suggested.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
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Program
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Psychology
