See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/12040233

Perceived Accuracy of Fortune Telling and Belief in the

Article in The Journal of Social Psychology · March 2001 DOI: 10.1080/00224540109600543 · Source: PubMed

CITATIONS READS 3 325

3 authors, including:

Margaret L. Signorella Pennsylvania State University, Brandywine

48 PUBLICATIONS 1,112 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Sexism and gender stereotyping in relationship advice View project

Accent and gender View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Margaret L. Signorella on 04 July 2015.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file. Fortune Telling 1! Perceived Accuracy of Fortune Telling and Belief in the Paranormal

Matthew Hughes Robert Behanna Margaret L. Signorella

The Pennsylvania State University

Author Notes

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Margaret L. Signorella, Penn State Greater Allegheny, 4000 University Drive, McKeesport, PA, 15132-7698. Email: [email protected].

Citation for the published version of the article: Hughes, M.,Behanna, R., & Signorella, M. L. (2001). Perceived accuracy of fortune telling and belief in the paranormal. Journal of Social Psychology, 141(1), 159-160. doi: 10.1080/00224540109600543 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00224540109600543#.VZf3e7cZf88 Fortune Telling 2!

Abstract

In the U.S. and similar countries, beliefs in the have remained stable or increased over the past decades. Psychology students rated their beliefs in a variety of paranormal topics. Students were randomly assigned to receive either a true fortune (i.e., using "real" fortune tellers' procedures) or a false one (produced by interchanging the meanings traditionally associated with the suits). Belief in those items most similar to reading—fortune telling, , and —were significantly associated with higher perceived accuracy of the fortune. The present results suggest that predicting an individual's susceptibility to an ostensibly paranormal event would require knowledge of the person's specific beliefs about the event, rather than general paranormal beliefs. Fortune Telling 3!

Perceived Accuracy of Fortune Telling and Belief in the Paranormal

Although empirical evidence for paranormal phenomena continues to be elusive (Hyman, 1996), in countries like the United States, beliefs in the supernatural have remained stable or increased since the 1970s (Nisbet, 1998). An important issue is whether there are significant consequences of paranormal beliefs. Glick, Gottesman, and Jolton (1989) found that astrology believers were more willing than non believers to accept the accuracy of "generalized" personality descriptions presented as horoscopes or personality descriptions.

In the present study, we extended the findings of Glick et al. ( 1989) to fortune telling or psychic readings. We compared U.S. college students' perceptions of the accuracy of a fortune "read" from cards with their paranormal beliefs. The provides the same type of vague, general descriptions found in horoscopes. The impact, however, may be greater for those who believe in the paranormal, because the reading is communicated in person (Blackmore, 1983).

Forty students (17 men, 23 women; mean age = 19.4 years, SD = 3.0), mostly in their first or second year of college, were volunteers from general psychology classes. They rated their degrees of belief in eight paranormal topics on a Likert-type scale (1 = do not believe in at all, 5 = believe in very strongly). The items-astrology, , clairvoyance, fortune telling, , space aliens, , and Bigfoot (a large ape like being supposedly roaming the northwest United States)-were based on Gallup polls (Gallup & Newport, 1990). Next, the students were told their fortunes with cards from a standard 52-card deck. They were randomly assigned to receive either a true fortune (i.e., using "real" fortune tellers' procedures) or a false one (produced by interchanging the meanings traditionally associated with the suits). The fortunes were portrayed as readings of recent past events (i.e., clairvoyance), rather than as predictions of future events, to avoid alarming believers with negative futures. We maintained ecological validity because "palm readers" or "psychic readers" include information about past events in their readings (Hyman, 1989). Last, we asked the students to rate the accuracy of their alleged fortunes on a Likert-type scale (1 = completely inaccurate, 5 = completely accurate).

Astrology had the highest average belief rating (M = 2.9, SD = 1.2); Bigfoot the lowest (M = 1.9, SD = 0.8). There were no effects of gender or fortune condition on the ratings of the paranormal items or the rating of the fortune accuracy. Rated accuracy of "true" fortunes (M = 2.59, SD = 1.1) was very close to rated accuracy of "false" fortunes (M = 2.61, SD = 1.3).

Total paranormal belief (the sum of the eight individual items) was not significantly associated with the rated accuracy of the fortune, although results were slightly in the direction of higher belief's predicting higher perceived accuracy, r(37) = .24. The weak overall association between belief and accuracy ratings occurred because only those items most similar to psychic reading— fortune telling, astrology, and clairvoyance—were significantly associated with perceived accuracy of the fortune, rs(38) = .45, .55, and .37, respectively. Fortune Telling 4!

The present results suggest that predicting an individual's susceptibility to an ostensibly paranormal event would require knowledge of the person's specific beliefs about the event, rather than general paranormal beliefs. In part, our findings reflect that, within a society, belief in a particular paranormal phenomenon is likely to be tied to such variables as group memberships, cohort, and exposure to media (Nisbet, 1998). Thus, those who attempt to teach students to critically assess evidence about paranormal phenomena may need to address each paranormal area individually and consider the social context of each belief. Finally, the absence of variables in the social context such as mystical trappings and peer pressure may have made the present participants less susceptible to the fortunes than they would have been in the real world.

References Blackmore, S. J. (1983). Divination with tarot cards: An empirical study. Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 52, 97-101. Gallup, G., & Newport, F. (1990, August 6). One in four Americans believes in ghosts. San Francisco Chronicle, p. 83. Glick. P., Gottesman, D., & Jolton, J. (1989). The fault is not in the stars: Susceptibility of skeptics and believers in astrology to the Barnum effect. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 15, 572-583. Hyman, R. (1989). The elusive quarry. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus. Hyman, R. (1996). The evidence for psychic functioning: Claim vs. reality. Skeptical Inquirer, 20(2), 24-26. Nisbet, M. (1998). New poll points to increase in paranormal belief. Skeptical Inquirer; 22(5), 9-12.

View publication stats