The Center for Research on Consciousness and Anomalous Psychology (CERCAP) is a parapsychological research organization based at the University of Lund in Sweden and headed by psychologist Etzel Cardeña.
Background
In 2005 the Thorsen Chair in Psychology was established at the University of Lund and awarded to Etzel Cardeña following a competitive selection process. Within the psychology department, Cardeña then established The Center for Research on Consciousness and Anomalous Psychology (CERCAP), a research group dedicated to ‘the scientific study of unusual but not pathological experiences and events, including reputed parapsychological phenomena’. CERCAP’s mission statement further reads:
We endorse programmatic research using a plurality of methodologies, and are open to diverse perspectives in this area, as long as they are informed and respectful. Our aim is to continue developing multidisciplinary, national, and international collaborations, and to train undergraduate and graduate students in a supportive environment.1
Research
CERCAP researchers have focused on anomalous experiences, the neurophenomenology of hypnotic phenomena and dissociation, and the relation between hypnotizability and performance in psi tasks. Samples of activities follow.
Ganzfeld
In 2011, Cardeña and David Marcusson-Clavertz reported a process-oriented ganzfeld telepathy study that investigated whether positive scoring might be linked to certain variables: belief in personal success, documented past psi experiences, and high hypnotizability.2
Positive scores were found to correlate with percipients’ expectations of success, while those who reported previous psi experiences performed significantly better than those who did not report them. The sense of being in an altered state correlated moderately to strongly with psi scores, but only for high hypnotizables. Dissociation also appeared to play a role in psi performance.
A replication study, focusing solely on highly hypnotizable participants and involving a larger sample, confirmed a moderate correlation between experiencing an altered state of consciousness and psi-hitting (p = 0.02). 3
Precognition Replication
CERCAP participated in a multi-lab experiment4 that attempted to replicate a precognition experiment reported by Daryl Bem in 2011.5 Bem adapted a standard psychology experiment in which response times to incongruent stimuli are shown to be longer than response times to congruent stimuli following the subliminal presentation of a priming image. Bem reversed the time sequence, so that the prime was presented after the judgement had been recorded (see details here). Evidence of precognition in Bem’s results was not replicated. Notably, however, exploratory analyses revealed a significant effect in English-language participants, parallelling Bem’s original study, while non-English translations showed no significant deviations from chance.
A second experiment attempted to strengthen the predicted effect by having participants read either a pro-psi or anti-psi statement at the experiment’s outset. While the primary psi hypothesis was not supported, it was observed that those subjects who were exposed to the pro-psi statement had a higher psi score than the anti-psi group (p = 0.05). Neither experimenter nor participant beliefs significantly correlated with the outcome; however, sensation seeking, a component of extraversion, proved to be a fairly robust psi performance correlate (p < 0.005).6
Dissociation
An EEG study analysed data produced in an earlier ganzfeld psi experiment of a highly hypnotizable woman who, in a state of dissociation, had unexpectedly recalled a near-fatal childhood drowning. Distinct EEG patterns were found that correlated with her dissociative experiences, with significant changes in activity across different brain regions during various stages. The findings highlighted the dynamic nature of dissociation and the importance of real-time EEG mapping to understand brain activity and its phenomenological correlates.7
Automatic Writing
An exploratory fMRI study investigated aspects of automatic writing produced by a person who wrote spontaneously and four individuals who were able to do so under hypnosis. Decreased BOLD signals in areas associated with agency and control were seen during automatic writing, with increased activity in regions related to sensory integration and motor control. Comparisons between the spontaneous automatic writer and the highly hypnotizables highlighted distinct neural and subjective experiences of automatic writing, with notable differences in brain activity and self-reported control, emphasizing the varied nature of automatic writing across individuals. The authors consider the study ‘a first step in the systematic study of very complex automatisms, which deserve greater scientific scrutiny’. 8
Mind Wandering
Cardeña and coauthors examined the relationship between sleep and mind-wandering in daily life, using ambulatory assessments. Two hundred and two participants wore wristband devices for a week, collecting actigraphy data on sleep and experience sampling data on mind-wandering. The team measured different features of mind wandering, including task-unrelated thoughts, stimulus-independent thoughts, and unguided thoughts. They also assessed sleep duration, fragmentation, and disturbances.
Contrary to expectations, task-unrelated and stimulus-independent thoughts were not associated with sleep measures. However, individual differences in unguided thoughts were associated with sleep disturbances and duration, suggesting that people who experience more unguided thoughts tend to have greater sleep disturbances and longer sleep duration.9
Boundarylessness
A 2023 study investigated neurocorrelates of boundarylessness, the experience of losing the self and entering nonduality with the universe, which is often reported to occur during meditation states. Thirty-two participants were recruited, including experienced meditators. Those who reported low or high boundarylessness, as compared to those in-between, showed higher functional connectivity within the default mode network during rest, less brain activity in the medial prefrontal cortex during self-referential word processing, and less self-endorsement of words related to constancy. The authors relate these nonlinear patterns to previous findings of a quadratic relation between boundarylessness and sense of ownership of experience. They suggest the results may reflect different stages in meditation practice or altered self-experience. Moreover, they found that focusing on the ‘center of experience’ elicited brain activation similar to meditation onset in both meditators and non-meditators.10
Michael Duggan
Literature
Bem, D. (2011). Feeling the Future: Experimental Evidence for Anomalous Retroactive Influences on Cognition and Affect. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 100, 407-25.
Cardeña, E., & Marcusson-Clavertz, D. (2020). Changes in state of consciousness and psi in ganzfeld and hypnosis conditions. Journal of Parapsychology 84, 66-84.
Cardeña, E., Lindström, L., Goldin, P., Westen, D., Mårtensson, J. (2023). A neurophenomenological fMRI study of a spontaneous automatic writer and a hypnotic cohort. Brain and Cognition 170/5, 1-12.
Jamieson, G., Cardeña, E., De Pascalis, V. (2024). Case Study A spontaneous dissociative episode during an EEG experiment. Brain and Cognition 174/3, 1-11.
Lindström, L., Goldin, P., Mårtensson, J., Cardeña, E. (2023). Nonlinear brain correlates of trait self-boundarylessness. Neuroscience of Consciousness 1, 1-13.
Marcusson-Clavertz, D., & Cardeña, E. (2011). Hypnotizability, alterations in consciousness, and other variables as predictors of performance in a ganzfeld psi task. Journal of Parapsychology 75, 235-59.
Marcusson-Clavertz, D., Persson, S., Davidson, P., Kim, J., Cardeña, E., Kuehner, C. (2022). Mind wandering and sleep in daily life: A combined actigraphy and experience sampling study. Consciousness and Cognition. 107/1, 1-15.
Marcusson-Clavertz, D., Simmonds-Moore, C., Cardeña, E., Roe, C., Wittmann, M., Dechamps, M., Wahbeh, H. (ongoing). Trait x state predictors of performance in Ganzfeld: An international multisite study. Bial Foundation grant 2022/208.
Schlitz, M., Bem, D., Marcusson-Clavertz, D., Cardeña, E.,Lyke, J., Grover, R., Blackmore, S., Tressoldi, P., Roney-Dougal, S., Bierman, D., Jolij, J., Lobach, E., Hartelius, G., Delorme, A. (2021). Two Replication Studies of a Time-Reversed (Psi) Priming Task and the Role of Expectancy in Reaction Times. Journal of Scientific Exploration 35/1, 65-90.