Testing for forced-choice precognition using a hidden task: two replications

This paper describes two extended replications of Luke, Delanoy, and Sherwood’s (2008) precognition effect using a covert task with contingent reward or punishment that found performance to be related to belief in luck. In Study 1, 25 participants completed the short-form Questionnaire of Beliefs About Luck (QBL) and then rated the pleasantness of sets of fractal images, which was a covert precognition task. Participants in the contingent condition subsequently completed a pleasant or unpleasant task based on performance; those in the no-contingent condition did not. Overall, participants selected more target images than MCE, t(24) = 2.60, p = .02, but there was no difference between the contingent and nocontingent conditions, t(23) = .73, p = .47. Performance was positively correlated with the Chance and Providence subscales of the QBL (r = .48, p = .02, and r = .39, p = .05 respectively). In Study 2, 32 participants completed Goldberg’s measure of openness to experience, Holt’s Creative Cognition Inventory and Luke et al.’s long-form QBL before taking the contingent version of the covert precognition task. Participants again selected more target images than MCE, t(31) = 2.01, p = .03. We did not replicate earlier correlations between performance and QBL subscales, nor with creativity measures, but there was a significant positive correlation with openness to experience (r = .46, p = .01).