Scientists shed light on how and why some people report “hearing the dead”

Spiritist mediums may be more prone to immersive mental activities and unusual hearing experiences early in life, according to new research.

This may explain why some people and not others eventually adopt spiritualistic beliefs and become involved in the practice of ‘listening to the dead’, concluded the study conducted by Durham University.

Mediums who “hear” spirits are said to be experiencing clairaudient communications, rather than clairvoyant (“seeing”) or clairvoyant (“feeling” or “feeling”) communications.

The researchers conducted a survey of 65 spiritualistic clairaudient mediums from the National Union of Spiritists and 143 members of the general population in the largest scientific study on the experiences of clairaudient mediums.

They found that these spiritualists are prone to absorption – a trait linked to immersion in mental or imaginative activities or to the experience of altered states of consciousness.

Mediums are also more likely to report experiences of unusual hearing phenomena, such as hearing voices, often occurring early in life.

Many who experience absorption or hear voices find spiritualistic beliefs in seeking the meaning behind, or the supernatural meaning of, their unusual experiences, the researchers said.

The results are published in the journal Mental health, religion and culture. The research is part of Hearing the Voice – an interdisciplinary study of voice hearing based at Durham University and funded by the Wellcome Trust.

Spiritism is a religious movement based on the idea that human souls continue to exist after death and communicate with the living through a medium or psychic.

Interest in Spiritualism is increasing in Britain with several organizations supporting, training and offering the services of practicing mediums. One of the largest, SNU, claims to serve at least 11,000 members through its training college, churches and centers.

Through their study, the researchers gathered detailed descriptions of how mediums experience the ‘voices’ of spirits and compared levels of absorption, tendency to hallucination, aspects of identity and belief in the paranormal.

They found that 44.6 percent of spiritualistic participants reported hearing the deceased’s voices daily, with 33.8 percent reporting a clairaudience experience on the last day.

The vast majority (79 percent) stated that the experiences of auditory spiritual communication were part of their daily lives, occurring both when they were alone and when they worked as mediums or attended a spiritist church.

Although spirits are heard mainly inside the head (65.1 percent), 31.7 percent of spiritual participants said they had experienced spiritual voices from inside and outside the head.

When assessed on absorption scales, as well as how strongly they believe in the paranormal, spiritualists scored much higher than members of the general population.

Spiritists were less likely to worry about what others thought of them than people in general, and also scored more on propensity for unusual auditory experiences, such as hallucinations.

Both high levels of absorption and propensity to such auditory phenomena were associated with reports of more frequent clairaudient communications, according to the results.

For the general population, absorption was associated with levels of belief in the paranormal, but there was no significant corresponding link between the belief and the tendency to hallucination.

There was also no difference in levels of superstitious belief or propensity for visual hallucinations between spiritualist and non-spiritualist participants.

Spiritists reported that they experienced clairaudience for the first time at an average age of 21.7 years. However, 18 percent of spiritualists reported having clairaudient experiences ‘as long as they can remember’ and 71 percent had not found Spiritism as a religious movement before their first experiences.

The researchers say their findings suggest that it is not giving in to social pressure, learning to have specific expectations or a level of belief in the paranormal that leads to experiences of spiritual communication.

Instead, it appears that some people have a unique predisposition for absorption and are more likely to report unusual hearing experiences that occurred early in life. For many of these individuals, spiritualistic beliefs are embraced because they align significantly with these unique personal experiences.

Principal investigator, Dr. Adam Powell, of the Hearing the Voice project at Durham University and the Department of Theology and Religion, said: “Our findings say a lot about ‘learning and longing’. For our participants, the principles of Spiritism seem to make sense childhood experiences, as well as the frequent auditory phenomena they experience as practicing mediums.

“But all of these experiences can result more from certain initial tendencies or skills than simply believing in the possibility of contacting the dead if we try hard enough.”

Dr. Peter Moseley, co-author of the study at Northumbria University, commented: “Spiritists tend to report unusual hearing experiences that are positive, start early in life and are often able to control. Understanding how they develop is important because it can help us understand more about distressing or uncontrollable experiences of hearing voices too “

Durham researchers are now engaged in further investigations of clairaudience and mediumship, working with practitioners to get a more complete picture of what it is like to receive these unusual and meaningful experiences.

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