Distant intentionality and the feeling of being stared at: Two meta-analyses
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Plain English Summary
Can one person's focused intention measurably affect another person's body from a distance? This landmark meta-analysis (a study that pools results from many experiments) tackled that question across 36 studies measuring tiny changes in skin conductance (basically, sweat responses) when a distant person concentrated on the participant. The overall verdict: a small but statistically significant effect emerged. However — and this is the really important part — when the authors zeroed in on just the seven highest-quality studies, the effect shrank to nearly nothing and was no longer significant. Better-designed studies consistently found weaker results, with randomization quality being the biggest factor. A separate batch of 15 "remote staring" experiments did show a small significant effect. The authors honestly acknowledged the pattern and called for more top-tier independent replications before drawing firm conclusions.
Abstract
Findings in parapsychology suggest an effect of distant intentionality. Two laboratory set-ups explored this topic by measuring the effect of a distant intention on psychophysiological variables. The 'Direct Mental Interaction in Living Systems' experiment investigates the effect of various intentions on the electrodermal activity of a remote subject. The 'Remote Staring' experiment examines whether gazing by an observer covaries with the electrodermal activity of the person being observed. Two meta-analyses were conducted. A small significant effect size ðd ¼ :11; p ¼ :001Þ was found in 36 studies on 'direct mental interaction', while a best-evidence-synthesis of 7 studies yielded d ¼ :05 ð p ¼ :50Þ: In 15 remote staring studies a mean effect size of d ¼ 0:13 ðp ¼ :01Þ was obtained. It is concluded that there are hints of an effect, but also a shortage of independent replications and theoretical concepts.
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📋 Cite this paper
Schmidt, Stefan, Schneider, Rainer, Utts, Jessica, Walach, Harald (2004). Distant intentionality and the feeling of being stared at: Two meta-analyses. British Journal of Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1348/0007126041546396
@article{schmidt_2004_distant,
title = {Distant intentionality and the feeling of being stared at: Two meta-analyses},
author = {Schmidt, Stefan and Schneider, Rainer and Utts, Jessica and Walach, Harald},
year = {2004},
journal = {British Journal of Psychology},
doi = {10.1348/0007126041546396},
}