Introductory and further reading in parapsychology

About parapsychology

Parapsychology is that scientific discipline which studies anomalous or paranormal consciousness phenomena - basically, psi and survival. These two basic categories can be broadly broken down as follows:

• Extra-sensory perception or ESP, the first type of psi, comes in three basic flavours: telepathy, clairvoyance or remote viewing, and precognition.
• Psychokinesis or PK, the second type of psi, is the direct influence of mind upon matter.
• The survival of consciousness after death includes but is not limited to: near-death experiences or NDEs, out-of-body experiences or OBEs/OOBEs, shared-death experiences or SDEs, mediumship, reincarnation, apparitions, and poltergeists.

Parapsychology can also broadly be split between experimental parapsychology, which is typically heavy in statistics, and non-experimental parapsychology, which is often based on case studies or case reports and field investigations.

The books and papers below provide good introductory and further reading material on parapsychology. Keep in mind though that some of these books and papers focus more on experimental parapsychology and psi without providing much (if any) introduction to the branch of parapsychology based on (case studies or field investigations into) survival.

Introductory reading list

• Damien Broderick and Ben Goertzel (editors), Evidence for Psi: Thirteen Empirical Research Reports ($) (2015)

Provides an overview from a more psi-friendly but still balanced point of view --per Chris

The 27-page introduction is currently available as part of a Google preview.

• Etzel Cardeña, The Experimental Evidence for Parapsychological Phenomena: A Review ($) (2018)

An academic paper discussing the experimental evidence, published in the journal American Psychologist, volume 73, pages 663-677. An unofficial version is available here.

• Harvey Irwin and Caroline Watt, An Introduction to Parapsychology ($) (5th edition, 2007)

A 320-page textbook.

The NDE chapter isn't great but in general it is fairly neutral and a good summary of the research in each area and conclusions to be had if any. --per Ian (Ninshub)

• Stanley Krippner and Harris L. Friedman (editors), Debating Psychic Experience: Human Potential or Human Illusion? ($) (2010)

An enjoyable read when first starting to wrap one's skeptical head around the possibility that psi might be more than just "woo". The proponents are persuasive in this volume and it helps to point out the strengths and weaknesses of the skeptical arguments against psi. --per berkelon

• Robert McLuhan, Randi's Prize: What Sceptics Say about the Paranormal, Why They Are Wrong and Why It Matters ($) (2010)

Discusses various anomalies from a serious, if journalistic, viewpoint. --per Kamarling

Further information about this book is available at the author's blog.

• Robert McLuhan (editor), Psi Encyclopedia (Society for Psychical Research)

Free web resource. Includes "Experimental Parapsychology," a general overview by Richard Broughton.

• Dean Radin, The Conscious Universe: The Scientific Truth of Psychic Phenomena ($) (2009)

Covers the history of the research of psi as such pretty well (though some may argue it's too proponent-biased), although not the whole breadth of what parapsychology investigates (apparitions, NDEs, etc. etc.). --per Ian (Ninshub)

• Michael Schmicker, Best Evidence: An Investigative Reporter's Three-Year Quest to Uncover the Best Scientific Evidence for ESP, Psychokinesis, Mental Healing, Ghosts and Poltergeists, Dowsing, Mediums, Near Death Experiences, Reincarnation, and Other Impossible Phenomena That Refuse to Disappear ($) (2nd edition, 2002)

Discusses various anomalies from a serious, if journalistic, viewpoint. --per Kamarling

• Caroline Watt, Parapsychology (Beginner's Guides) ($) (2016)

Mildly sceptical in tone, but that may be helpful for someone coming from a sceptical position. --per Chris

Further reading list

• Etzel Cardeña, John Palmer, David Marcusson-Clavertz, Parapsychology: A Handbook for the 21st Century (2015)

In a similar but slightly higher price bracket to Harvey Irwin and Caroline Watt's An Introduction to Parapsychology, though probably beyond the introductory category --per Chris

• Edwin May, Sonali Marwaha, Extrasensory Perception: Support, Skepticism, and Science (Two Volumes) (2015)

At £97 for the Kindle edition, it's obviously not for the casual reader --per Chris

• Benjamin B Wolman, Handbook of parapsychology (1977)

Note that this work dates back to 1977, but at 967 pages it provides very detailed coverage of older work. A copy is available for electronic borrowing at the Internet Archive.

Origins

This page was seeded from the forum thread Recommendations for a general introduction to parapsychology. The italicised comments above are posters' assessments which have been pulled from that thread as near to verbatim as possible whilst maintaining a consistent grammar. Further suggestions, comments and discussion are available in that thread.