Experimenter effects and the remote facilitation of attention focusing: Two studies and the discovery of an artefact - Brief Article

ABSTRACT: Two studies explored how participants' beliefs about the previous psi research track record of their experimenter might affect their responses on questionnaire measures of belief in psi, confidence of success at a psi task, perceived success at the psi task, actual success at the psi task, and evaluations of the experimenter. Participants (60 in each study) were allocated to either a positive expectancy or a negative expectancy condition. Prior to having any contact with their experimenter (CW), participants read a simulated 1-page background article that depicted CW either as having a previous track record of positive psi results (positive expectancy condition) or as having a previous track record of null psi results (negative expectancy condition). Participants then completed questionnaire measures of belief in psi and confidence of success at the psi task. The psi task was remote facilitation of focusing of attention. The participants ("helpees") attempted to focus their attention on a candle and holder and indicated by pressing a hand-held button when they felt their attention had wandered from the focus. While doing this task, CW, who was located in a separate, sensorially isolated room, either simultaneously focused on a similar candle and holder (help periods) or did some irrelevant task (control periods) according to a random but counterbalanced schedule of 16 one-mm epochs (4 help-control pairs, 4 control-help pairs). Following the psi task, but without knowing its results, participants rated their perceived success at the task and rated CW for warmth, professionalism, and the degree to which she instilled confidence for the task. A remote facilitation of attention-focusing effect was predicted, indicated by fewer distractions during the help periods compared with the control periods. In addition, positive expectancy participants were predicted to have greater psi scores than negative expectancy participants, and an interaction was predicted between participants' belief in psi and their expecta ncy condition, which would affect their psi results. Because of a computer error, psi results could not be reported for Study 1. There were no significant differences between positive and negative expectancy participants on the questionnaire measures. There was a nonsignificant trend for believers' belief scores to be influenced by expectancy condition, but not disbelievers' belief scores. Study 2, conducted to replicate and extend on Study 1, found no indication of remote facilitation of attention focusing. There was no difference between psi scores in the positive expectancy condition compared with the negative expectancy condition, and no interaction was found between belief and expectancy condition. The trend in Study 1 was confirmed in Study 2: Believers' belief scores were significantly higher in the positive expectancy condition compared with the negative expectancy condition. Post hoc, it was found that participants' evaluations of the degree to which the experimenter instilled confidence in the task were significantly more positive for the positive expectancy group, compared with the negative expectancy group, for Studies 1 and 2 combined. The paper describes the discovery of an artefact in Study 1 and discusses how this relates to the question of experimenter effects.

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