Perrott-Warrick Research Unit

The Perrott-Warrick Research Unit, a parapsychological research program located within the Psychology Department at the University of Hertfordshire in England, was launched in 1995 following Richard Wiseman's reception of a Perrott-Warrick Fellowship (administered by Trinity College Cambridge). Wiseman, a practicing stage magician, had received his Ph.D. in psychology from Edinburgh University before joining the faculty at Hertfordshire. Since receiving the fellowship, he has launched a multifaceted research program that includes probes into the paranormal, intuition, false memory syndrome, and lying and deception. He has also worked on promoting the public understanding of science and has frequently appeared on television discussing his research and related topics. In 1998 he brought together psychologists, historians, magicians, and professional actors to stage "Séance," a show that encouraged the public to think critically about claims of the paranormal, and the following year he was awarded Britain's first Readership in the Public Understanding of Psychology.

To carry out his research, Wiseman has assembled a team of doctoral students, each of which are exploring different topics under his supervision. Emma Greening, while pursuing a Ph.D. in psychology, possesses a scholarship funded by the Society for Psychical Research and is conducting a research project on belief in the paranormal and the development of false memories. Before beginning her graduate program, she had been the editor of The Paranormal Review (for the Society for Psychical Research), and she serves as secretary of its research activities committee.

Ciaran James O'Keefe completed his master's thesis on the utility of psychic detectives and analyzed the style of their narrative, which he concluded tended to convince the listener that there was a higher degree of accuracy in the psychic words than actually existed. Building on this research, he is currently researching the discourse that occurs in psychic readings, both mediumistic session and phone sessions on psychic hotlines. Paul Rogers is working on people with reputed intuitive powers. He is testing their ability to size up other people's personality relative to the ability of nonintuitive people. In the process, he is trying to discover which factors convince a person of his/ her own intuitive abilities.

The Perrott-Warrick Research Unit may be reached c/o Psychology Department, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield Campus, University of Hertfordshire, College Lane, Hatfield, Herts, AL10 9AB, England. The unit has an Internet site at http://phoenix.herts.ac.uk/PWRU/hmpage.html.

Sources:

The Perrott-Warrick Research Unit.http://phoenix.herts.ac.uk/PWRU/hmpage.html. May 23, 2000.