Pseudoscience and the Paranormal

all about them, their problems, and their deep personal secrets, fears, and desires. The technique is called cold reading and is probably as old as charlatanism itself. The technique has been described in detail by Hyman (1976–77).

In a cold reading, the reader begins with a “stock spiel,” a set of general statements that will apply to almost everyone. Because the majority of human problems fall into one of three general categories—sex, money, or health—the reader already has some idea of the nature of the victim’s problem. Of course, the nature of the problem can, to some extent, be predicted by carefully observing the age, mode of speech, style of dress, and physical appearance of the victim. If the victim is young, health problems are not likely to be the reason for the consultation. Sex or personal problems are much more likely to be the reason for the visit. If the victim is a college student—this can be ascertained by simply asking during pre-reading chitchat, another extremely valuable source of information, or by noting a college ring or fraternity pin-concern about grades is also a strong possibility. In any case, information obtained by careful observation of the victim is then used to guide the reading toward the most likely problem area. For example, if a woman comes in wearing an expensive dress and lots of jewelry, money is probably not the problem she’s come to talk about. Elderly people are more likely to have health problems, and many of these can be spotted simply by looking at the victim—the tremors of Parkinson’s disease, the hobbling caused by arthritis, and the types of paralysis caused by some strokes can all be readily observed.

As an exercise, put yourself in the position of a cold reader and see what you make of this: A middle-aged man, good looking and well dressed, walks in. During idle chat before the reading, you discover he’s in town for a week or so on business. You also note that there is a white area of skin at the base of his ring finger. What do you conclude?

Students often answer that the fellow has been recently divorced and thus no longer wears a wedding ring. A logical response, and perhaps right, but there is another, somewhat seamier, possibility: Perhaps the man is playing around while he’s away from his wife and that’s why he’s not wearing his ring. How do you tell which alternative is true, or whether neither is true? (After all, his wife could have died recently.) Finding out is simple— you ask, but in such a way that he’s not aware you’re asking and isn’t aware he’s given you the information. You then, later in the reading, feed the information he’s given you back to him, and he’s probably amazed at your psychic powers.

One of the most powerful sources of information for a cold reader is vague statements in the form of leading questions. For example, you could say something like, “I see a recent loss in your life,” and inflect the end of the sentence like a question. Because of the inflection, the victim will almost always respond as to a question. He may answer right out, “Yes, my wife just died,” or “My wife and I were separated last month.” Or the response may be more subtle and almost unconscious—a nod of the head, for example. Even such subtle responses confirm that you’re on the right track. If you get a puzzled look and a shake of the head, you know you’re on the wrong track. He hasn’t suffered a recent loss, so the “fooling around” hypothesis is more likely. At this point, don’t come out and say, “I see you cheating on your wife.” Never make a specific statement like that in a cold reading. For one thing, it may get you a fist in your face. For another, it may start the victim wondering how you obtained such specific information, and he may be able to figure it out for himself. Instead, make it a bit vague: “The spirits point to less than total satisfaction with the woman in your life.” Note that you don’t say “your wife” here. By being vague, you’re protecting yourself: You may be wrong after all. Maybe his wife did just die. How embarrassing it would be for you to say “your wife” and use the present tense.

In any event, when you make the comment and watch for the victim’s response, you’ll learn more. Let’s assume the victim’s response is a sigh and a nod. This is evidence that the “fooling around” hypothesis is correct. But again, don’t make a specific statement. In fact, a good strategy at this point would be to drop the topic and move on to other areas, perhaps doing a little fishing about financial matters. Later, when the victim has probably forgotten the details of your comments about his marital affairs, vague as they were, pop in something like, “I’m getting part of a word or a name. Frank? Frank something? Does that mean anything to you?” Note that you’re asking him, not telling him, but that won’t be noticed. Let us assume, for this example, that several notorious pickup bars in town are on Franklin Avenue so, if your “fooling around” hypothesis is right, the partial name “Frank” will mean something to him. (A good cold reader must keep up on the locations of such places, and much else besides.)

If you’re good, this fellow will leave wondering how you knew he was planning to go to that pickup place on Franklin and hoping that his wife never develops psychic powers, of which he has just seen such an impressive demonstration.

Another technique used by psychics is the multiple out. The basic idea is to make statements or predictions that are vague and nebulous, so that they can be interpreted, often after the fact, to fit almost any outcome. Thus one of the great powers of the cold reading is the very vagueness of the statements the reader makes. In the above example, the victim would be just as impressed with the reader’s “psychic” powers if he were planning to go to Franklin Avenue that night, if he had thought about going but decided against it, or if he had gone some previous night or during a previous trip. In other words, because of the vague nature of the reading, there are numerous real-life situations that are consistent with it, and the reader gets credit for being psychic if any of them have taken place, have been thought about, or occur in the future. This characteristic of the cold reading is actively enhanced by the reader, who will often preface the reading by saying something like, “the messages I get are often symbolic and have to be fitted into your particular life.”

One sometimes hears of people who have consulted psychics and claim to have been told extremely specific facts about themselves and their friends that the psychic “couldn’t possibly have known.” Again, it’s simple, once you know the gimmick. The reader asks questions about initials and common names: “I see the initial J—is there an important J in your life?” If not, little is lost, but since the victim has been instructed to interpret what the reader says, he or she will search around in memory for someone with a first or last name beginning with J. Note also that “important” is itself a vague term. Important how? A lover, a colleague, a fellow student, a child, a friend? There are dozens of possibilities.

The reader can run the same trick with a full name: “Does the name Fred mean anything to you?” To which the response will often be something like, “My God, Fred Black, how did you ever know about him? Why, I haven’t seen Fred since that football game back in college.” Of course, the reader didn’t know about Fred Black, the football game, or college. But the victim is now convinced that he did and will swear that the psychic told him about Fred Black, even though he had no way of knowing about him. Sometimes it’s not even necessary to supply the name, the victim will do it himself. A statement like “I see in the cards that you’re not happy with your personal relationships” can elicit the response, “How did you ever know that Sally and I were having problems ^? ” The reader didn’t know, but the victim will have missed that.

What does the reader do next? A good cold reader tells victims what they want to hear: “Don’t worry, the tea leaves tell me that it will all work out for the best in the end.” This doesn’t really mean anything, but the victim, convinced of the psychic’s powers, will believe the reader has foretold a pleasant outcome. It’s likely that the victim will be back again, money in hand, the next time he or she has a problem.

Tarot cards have been in use since at least the fourteenth century (Hargrave 1930/1966) and are widely used by cold readers. Susan Blackmore (1983), a parapsychologist with “eight years experience of using the cards for divination” (p. 97), performed a study of the accuracy of personality readings given using the cards. She found that when she gave the reading “face to face,” subjects rated the reading as highly accurate. However, when asked to pick their own reading from among nine others, subjects were unable to do so and “tended to choose readings which were most general.”

One of the most fascinating effects of cold readings is that they not only convince the victim that the reader has paranormal powers, they can also convince the reader of the same thing. Ray Hyman, a psychologist who studies why people believe in the paranormal, became interested in the issue when, as a student, he became convinced that he really could divine amazing information from the lines in people’s palms. Let Hyman (1976–77) tell the story in his own words:

One danger of playing the role of reader is that you will persuade yourself that you are really divining true character. This happened to me. I started reading palms in my teens as a way to supplement my income from doing magic and mental shows. When I started I did not believe in palmistry. But I knew that to “sell” it I had to act as if I did. After a few years I became a firm believer in palmistry. One day the late Dr. Stanley Jaks, who was a professional mentalist and a man I respected, tactfully suggested that it would make an interesting experiment if I