Remote facilitation of attention focusing with psi-supportive versus psi-unsupportive experimenter suggestions.

Eighty individuals took part in a study in which a single experimenter made either psi-supportive or psi-unsupportive suggestions prior to administering questionnaire measures and a psi task. The psi task was remote facilitation of attention focusing, with the dependent variable the participant’s self-reported number of distractions during Help epochs compared with Control epochs while focusing on a lit candle. During Help epochs, a remote individual also focused on a lit candle and maintained the mental intention to help the participant have fewer distractions than during Control epochs. Questionnaire measures were taken of participants’ psi belief, confidence, expected success, perceived success, and quality of focusing. Participants also rated the experimenter’s warmth, professionalism, ability to instil confidence in the task, and belief in psi. No over all remote facilitation of focusing was found, nor was there any difference between positive vs. negative suggestion groups on their psi performance. The groups differed on many of the questionnaire measures, including psi belief, confidence, expected and perceived success, quality of focusing, and experimenter ratings. The results point to an effect of the experimenter’s psi-supportive and psi-unsupportive suggestions on many of the psychological measures taken but no effects of suggestion on the psi task.