Welcome to the Psi Encyclopedia! We aspire to provide a comprehensive introduction to academic parapsychology, which studies the range of psychic experiences collectively termed ‘psi’. The existence of psi phenomena – and the related idea that consciousness is independent of the physical body and so may survive death – is strongly disputed by materialist scientists, yet parapsychologists are convinced they have evidence for these things. The Psi Encyclopedia presents this evidence in nearly 750 signed articles by over 80 authors, many of them senior academics, arranged in categories and subcategories that highlight the major interests of the field.
Mark Boccuzzi created this short video that explains what we are about.
Featured
Stephen E Braude
American philosopher and parapsychologist (1945–2026) remembered for his field investigations of apparent psychokinesis.
Meditation and Psi
Traditional Yogic teachings state that a person who attains a higher state of consciousness will manifest psychic powers.
Psychedelics and Psi
A gradual easing of restrictions means that psi research with psychedelics, once prevalent, could soon resume.
Psi Research in China
Recent experimental and theoretical work in China includes successful attempts to train ESP abilities in blind children.
Clinical Parapsychology
Therapeutic approach that aims to provide support for people disturbed by anomalous event experiences.
Psi for Financial Gain
Anecdotal accounts and lab tests suggest that psi can at times be used to advantage in gambling and financial speculation.
Coover Telepathy Experiments
Early telepathy experiments, once thought a failure, now considered statistically significant.
Key Topics
Psychology and Parapsychology
Explores the overlap between psychology and parapsychology, such as personality and other variables linked to psi.
Remote Viewing
An experimental form of clairvoyance, in which a suitably trained person attempts to visualise the topography of a distant scene.
Near-Death Experience (Overview)
This article describes anomalous mental events reported by people who have survived a near-fatal accident or illness.
Animals in Psi Research
The psi abilities of animals have been reported in informal observations and tests, including modern lab experiments.
Mediumship and Multiple Personality
The personalities of mediumistic communicators are similar to dissociative identity disorder.
Society for Psychical Research (SPR)
Membership organization founded in London in 1882 for the scientific investigation of claims of psychic phenomena.
European Children with Past-Life Memories
European children speak of past lives less often than Asian children do, yet the cases are very similar.
Anthropology and Psi Research
Anthropologists have long been fascinated by belief in psi, a near universal aspect of human culture.
Recent Additions
Boston Society for Psychic Research
Organisation formed from the American Society for Psychical Research in 1925, reuniting with it in 1941.
Marcello Truzzi
American sociologist known for distinguishing open-minded scepticism of psi phenomena from simple debunking.
Ada Goodrich Freer
Clairvoyant who contributed to studies of crystal-gazing, second sight and hauntings in the 1890s.
Placement Effects in Psychokinesis Tests
Haakon Forwald tested whether his willed psychokinesis could deflect thrown dice and other cubes.
Haakon Forwald
Norwegian-born Swedish engineer and inventor who conducted innovative placement PK experiments with dice and cubes.
Visualizing the Supernatural
This 2025–26 museum exhibition traced 250 years of visual culture surrounding apparitions, mediumship and the occult.
René Peoc’h
French researcher whose studies with imprinted chicks suggested they can bias the movement of a robot through PK.
Antony Flew
British analytic philosopher known for his influential critiques of theism, postmortem survival and parapsychology.
Coin Apports: The Mexico City Case
A variety of coins appeared without an obvious normal source or cause.
Robert McLuhan
British journalist, a prominent interpreter of parapsychology for general readers and the principal architect of the Psi Encyclopedia.
Annekatrin Angelika Puhle
German researcher whose work touches on cultural history, dreams, apparitions, magic and anomalous light experiences.
Ouija Board
Ouija boards have sometimes allowed for veridical communications from apparent spirit entities and for automatic writing in creative productions.
Susan Gerbic
American studio photographer who exposes what she believes to be pseudoscience through a special brand of 'guerilla skepticism'.
Julian Ochorowicz
Polish philosopher, psychologist and inventor (1850–1917), who made notable investigations of physical mediumship.
Minot Judson Savage
Savage (1841–1918) was a Unitarian minister who sat with Leonora Piper and was involved with the early American Society for Psychical Research.
Noah’s Ark Society for Physical Mediumship
The NAS originated in a home circle in 1990 and indirectly fostered the later Scole Circle.
Martin Johnson
As a major European experimental parapsychologist, Johnson (1930–2011) helped build the programme at the University of Utrecht.
Milan Ryzl
Milan Ryzl (1928–2011) was a pioneer in exploring hypnosis as a facilitator of ESP, best known for his extensive work with Pavel Stepanek.
Cold Spots
Sudden sensations or measurements of temperature variations recur in reports of apparitions, séances and hauntings.
Dieter Vaitl
German consciousness researcher who directed the Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology and Mental Health (IGPP) for two decades.
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ESP & Psychokinesis
Extra-sensory perception (ESP) comprises telepathy, clairvoyance and precognition. Psychokinesis (PK) is the direct influence on matter by mind alone. Both ESP and PK have been tested in the laboratory and studied in real life situations. Together they constitute psi, in the strict sense of the term. Subcategories group together overviews and general topics in psi studies, tests of ESP and PK, and researcher biographies.
John G Kruth
Executive director of the Rhine Research Center. His research interests include bioenergy in healing.
Observational Theories of Psi
Review of research on the idea that psi works by cognizing and manipulating the invisible underworld of quantum probabilities.
Àlex Gómez-Marín
Alex Gomez-Marin is a Spanish physicist and neuroscientist with research interests in parapsychology.
Mind & Body
This category contains articles that treat consciousness in relation to the body. Subcategories focus on consciousness and psi; dreams and psi; and distant healing and psychotherapy. Also included are sitter groups and macro-psychokinesis as well as poltergeists, often assumed to relate to discarnate entities but now known more often to have living agents. A final subgroup is concerned with out-of-body and near-death experiences and events reported on the threshold of death.
Christine Beauchamp
Noted case of multiple personality disorder reported by American psychologist Morton Prince in 1906.
Stella Cranshaw
London nurse (1900–1986) who produced abundant phenomena in investigative sittings organized in the 1920s by Harry Price.
Maimonides Dream Telepathy Research
This article describes ESP dreaming experiments carried out in a New York sleep laboratory.
Survival of Death
Life continued in a spiritual or purely mental form after bodily death is a staple of religious beliefs worldwide, and likely is as old as humanity. The question of evidence for it has been central to the Society for Psychical Research since its founding in 1882. Subcategories focus on hauntings and apparitions and on psychic (also called mental) mediumship.
Poltergeists (Overview)
This article provides an introduction to poltergeist research, describing major cases and theoretical perspectives.
Everton de Oliveira Maraldi
Brazilian psychologist with research interests in the psychology of non-ordinary experiences, spirituality, religion and health.
Doris Stokes
Doris Stokes (1920–1987) was a controversial celebrity medium who was much in the public eye in Britain during the 1980s.
Reincarnation
Reincarnation beliefs are widespread in the world and in recent decades researchers have found what they believe is evidence of them through the study of people (mainly children) who claim to have lived before. Subcategories highlight case studies, past life regression, and biographies of major researchers.
Signs of Reincarnation in Africa
Reincarnation beliefs in Africa are associated with signs such as a parent’s dreams and a child’s birthmarks.
Interethnic and Intercultural Reincarnation Cases
Strong behavioual carryovers often accompany cases of these kinds.
American Children with Past-Life Memories
List of cases of children’s past-life memories from the Americas, with descriptions.
Researchers & Authors
Here can be found more than 300 biographical profiles of key figures who have been involved in psi research and parapsychology as field investigators, experimentalists, theorists and commentators. The biographies are grouped in subcategories by 30-year age cohorts, highlighting contemporaries.
Julian Ochorowicz
Polish philosopher, psychologist and inventor (1850–1917), who made notable investigations of physical mediumship.
Ada Goodrich Freer
Clairvoyant who contributed to studies of crystal-gazing, second sight and hauntings in the 1890s.
Mario Varvoglis
American parapsychologist living in France, president of the Institut Métapsychique International.
Organizations
The oldest organizations devoted to parapsychology were member organizations like the Society for Psychical Research, established in London in 1882. Since JB Rhine founded the Parapsychology Laboratory at Duke University in 1930, there have been university-based units as well. This category comprises both historical and contemporary bodies concerned with research and education in parapsychology.
Southern California Society for Psychical Research
Organization founded in 1961 and merged with the International Foundation for Survival Research, now also defunct, in 1983.
Society for Psychical Research (SPR)
Membership organization founded in London in 1882 for the scientific investigation of claims of psychic phenomena.
Institute of Paranormal Psychology (IPP)
Argentinian organization established in 1994 that conducts psi research and provides educational resources.
Sceptical Views
Sceptics argue that psychics and mediums achieve their effects by trickery, that psychic experience is an illusory effect caused by a combination of brain misperceptions and confirmation bias, and that evidence of psi in laboratory tests can be attributed to poor methodology. This category includes biographies of leading sceptics as well as general articles discussing their allegations.
Michael Shermer
Well-known American author, media personality and career sceptic, founder of the Skeptics Society and its magazine Skeptic.
Criticisms of Reincarnation Case Studies
This article addresses objections critics have raised to the reincarnation case research of Ian Stevenson and others.
Martin Gardner
American critic of parapsychology and paranormal claims (1914–2010), a founding member of the modern sceptical movement.
General Topics
This category contains articles on a variety of topics that do not fit well in any of the main categories, from dowsing to crop circles and other anomalistic phenomena, the Miscellaneous Anomalistic subcategory. Other subcategories list articles on psychics and mystic and on important articles, books and journals in the field of parapsychology.
Henry Gross
American game warden and dowser (1895–1979) who located water for landowners in his home state of Maine and in Bermuda.
Electromagnetism and Paranormal Phenomena
Electromagnetism may be implicated in reports of seemingly paranormal phenomena.
Photography and the Paranormal
Apparently paranormal images captured on film are vulnerable to claims of misinterpretation, malpractice or fraud.