The Noetic Experience and Belief Scale: A validation and reliability study

Introduction

“Paranormal beliefs pertain to phenomena that have not been empirically attested to the satisfaction of the scientific establishment”¹. Paranormal beliefs encompass a broad range of concepts, such as ghosts or spirits, extrasensory perception (ESP), extraterrestrial beings, and mind-to-mind communication, or telepathy. Belief in the paranormal is widespread around the world^1–13. For example, in a Gallup poll of 1,002 United States adults conducted in 2005, 55% respondents believed in psychic or spiritual healing or the power of the human mind to heal the body, 41% believed in extrasensory perception, and 31% believed in telepathy or mind-to-mind communication¹⁴.

However, having a belief in the paranormal does not necessarily mean having experienced the paranormal. A paranormal experience refers to an individual’s memory of an experience that one judges to be genuine. The memory of a paranormal experience relies on a different mental substrate than a belief based on environment, education and reasoning and the neural structures underlying memory of an experience and belief are likely different^15,16. Paranormal belief and experience are often correlated when measured simultaneously, although this is rarely done^17,18. For example, one study found a positive correlation (r = 0.61) between paranormal experience and belief scores¹². Another interesting study found that exposure to television programs that regularly depict paranormal phenomena was positively correlated with belief, but only for respondents who had personal experiences¹⁹.

Prevalence of reported paranormal experiences evaluated over the last 40 years in a variety of populations has ranged from a low of 10% in Scottish citizens²⁰ to a high as 97% in enthusiasts in the United States¹². Two very large prevalence studies have been conducted. One surveyed adults in 13 European countries and the United States (N=18,607). European respondents reported experiencing telepathy (34%), clairvoyance (21%), and contact with the dead (25%). Percentages for the U.S. adults were considerably higher: 54%, 25%, and 30% respectively²¹. Another large study of British adults (n=4,096) found that 37% of respondents reported at least one paranormal experience defined as precognitions, extra-sensory perception, mystical experiences, telepathy, and after-death communication²². Other smaller prevalence studies have been conducted around the world. Haraldsson et al. conducted two surveys of prevalence in Iceland, one in 1974 with 902 participants⁵ and one in 2006 with 991 participants³. He found that psychic phenomena actually increased from 59% of men and 71% of women in 1974 to 70% of men and 81% of women in 2006. In Scotland, 10–16% of the general population sample (n – 241) had experienced second sight, with the exception of the Grampian area where prevalence was more than doubled at 33%²⁰. Chinese, Japanese, African-American and Caucasian-American college students (n - 1922) were surveyed and 31–47% reported having at least one experience²³. Of 502 adults in Winnipeg, Canada 65%²⁴ and 38% of 622 Charlottesville, Virginia students and townspeople²⁵ reported having at least one experience. In the United States, 67% of the 1460 participants reported having had an ESP experience, 31% a clairvoyant experience, and 42% contact with the dead²⁶. More recently in the United States, 89.3% of the general population, 89.5% of scientists and engineers, and 97.8% of paranormal enthusiasts reported at least one paranormal experience (n – 899)¹².

Specificity of the work in this field is limited by the lack of questionnaires that adequately separate paranormal belief from experience and do so concisely^1,27. Using ambiguous measures can lead to confounding the two constructs of belief and experience, and blur results^1,6. Instruments that do separate these constructs are long and not conducive to the time constraints of many studies - see Exceptional Experiences Questionnaire²⁸ and Anomalous Experience Inventory²⁹. To address these limitations and as part of a larger research program on extended human capacities, we created the Noetic Experience and Belief Scale (NEBS), a 20-item survey that evaluates paranormal beliefs and experiences separately. The present studies investigate the psychometric properties of the Noetic Experience and Belief Scale in two populations. By studying these phenomena, we aim to gain a deeper understanding of the nature of consciousness and the reach of human potential.

Initial development of the NEBS The NEBS was developed through consensus by the authors and two expert consultants who actively work in the field. This group was informed by our own previous studies and by reviewing other studies and previously used instruments that evaluated paranormal beliefs and/or experiences. One previous study³⁰ evaluated the prevalence of 27 paranormal experiences listed here in decreasing order of prevalence: Claircognizance, Clairempathy, Precognition, Lucid Dreaming, Emotional Healing, Clairvoyance, Clairsentience, Animal Communication, Telepathy, Aura Reading, Astral Projection, Clairaudience, Clairalience, Mediumship, Channeling, Physical Healing, Geomancy, Retrocognition, Psychometry, Remote Viewing, Automatic Writing, Clairgustance, Psychokinesis, Pyrokinesis, Levitation, and Psychic Surgery (please see extended data for definitions of each of these terms³¹). Based on feedback from participants and a review of these items, we removed emotional healing (very similar to physical healing), psychic surgery (very rare), and clairsentience (very similar to claircognizance), renamed channel to psychophony and mediumship to contact with the dead, and added the item Information from Dreams. We then conducted another prevalence study in a different population. Notably, we did not use the jargon term for each paranormal belief/experience, but instead used as neutral language as possible to describe the experience itself. For example, rather than asking if the participant had ever experienced “pyrokinesis - the ability to create and/or manipulate fire”, the item asked “Have you ever created fire using only your concentration or will?” These neutral language items were then administered to 899 participants consisting of three samples: a general population sample, scientists and engineers, and paranormal enthusiasts¹².

In both studies, we found that some items were highly correlated and represented overlapping constructs. They could also be viewed as specific nuanced experiences within a larger extended human capacities category. For example, psychic physical healing or the purported ability to feel other people’s physical symptoms in your own body and heal, transform, or transmute them would fall under the umbrella category of psychokinesis or the purported ability to influence a physical system without any physical interaction or with mental effort alone. Thus, in an effort to reduce participant burden and allow for quick assessment of experiences and beliefs we collapsed any overlapping constructs into individual items for each of the following categories: 1. Non-local consciousness (e.g. Astral Projection, Lucid Dreaming); 2. Extraterrestrials; 3. Precognition/Retrocausation; 4. Survival of Consciousness (after bodily death); 5. Contact with the dead (Mediumship); 6. Clairvoyance (Claircognizance, Clairempathy, Clairvoyance, Clairsentience, Aura Reading, Clairalience, Clairaudience, Geomancy, Clairgustance, Remote Viewing, Psychometry, Animal Communication); 7. Psychokinesis (Physical Healing, Psychokinesis, Psychic Surgery, Pyrokinesis, Levitation); 8. Telepathy; 9. Automatism (Channeling, Automatic Writing)

We also reviewed a number of existing questionnaires that measured paranormal experience and/or belief^{8,26,28,29,32–45}. Each scale was evaluated for number of items, belief and experience as separate constructs, and subscales (please see extended data³¹). From this review, an additional item on intuition, representing perhaps the most common paranormal experience, was added to the new scale for a total of 10-items.

The instrument was called the Noetic Experience and Belief Scale using noetic from the Greek noēsis/noētikos, meaning inner wisdom, direct knowing, or subjective understanding; and unlike a vague impression, a noetic experience carries a deep sense of authority and certainty. We included “noetic” in the title rather than “paranormal” in part because of the stigma associated with the term paranormal, which could introduce bias that might be mitigated by using an alternate term. Similarly, the paranormal categories were not stated in the scale but only descriptions of the constructs included (please see extended data³¹.

The objectives of the following two observational studies were to evaluate the validity and reliability of the NEBS and to confirm the two latent variables of belief and experience in a confirmatory factor analysis. In study 1, the survey was administered to 350 participants for the validity and confirmatory factor analyses and again to a subsample of 96 of these participants for a test-retest analysis. In study 2, the survey was administered to a different population where divergent validity was evaluated and the factor model reevaluated. We hypothesized that NEBS would be valid, reliable, and demonstrate good fit for a model with belief and experience as latent variables in both populations.

STUDY 1: General population sample

Results

Construct validity In total, 444 began the survey; 26 did not agree to the consent form and 57 agreed to the consent form but did not complete the survey. The remaining 361 participants completed the survey (underlying data⁵⁰). Surveys were collected between November 9, 2018 and December 13, 2018. Participants were on average 44 years old ± 16.8 and had 14.5 ± 5.3 years of education. Of these, 52% were female and 56.8% were in-relationship. Participants were mostly Caucasian (67% Caucasian, 13% Black or African American, 8% Hispanic or Latino, 6% Asian or Pacific Islander, 5% American Indian or Alaskan Native, and 2% preferred not to answer). In terms of salary, 67% of participants had earned between 0 and $75,000 (30% Under $30K, 37% $30K to under $75K, 11% $75K to under $100K, 11% $100K or under $150K, 7% $150K to under $250K, 3% $250K or greater, 2% Decline to answer) with an average household size of 2.6 ± 1.4.

The means and standard deviations for the paranormal belief and experience questionnaires are shown in Table 1. All correlation pairs were positive and significant at p = 0.05 level or less (all but three being more than p < 0.00005).

Belief and Experience as separate constructs

Confirmatory factor analysis was performed based on data from 361 respondents; there were no missing data. The retest data of the 96 participants were not included in the confirmatory factor analysis modeling. A correlation table of observed values with means and standard deviations is shown in Table 2. The a priori theoretical model of Belief and Experience items as described in the statistics section is presented in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Theoretical and observed model of Noetic Experience and Belief Scale (NEBS) Belief and Experience.

Significant covariances are denoted with curved arrows and error terms are displayed.

We hypothesized a two-factor model to be confirmed in the measurement portion of the model where Belief and Experience were the latent variables. We evaluated the assumptions of univariate and multivariate normality and linearity. Univariate variables were not normally distributed individually. The ADF estimation method was used because it makes no assumption of joint normality or even symmetry for observed or latent variables (StataCorp, 2013). Residuals were normally distributed. There were no observations with a Cook’s distance greater than 1. No variable had a VIF less than 0.1 or greater than 10 (average VIF for all variables 3.29) indicating acceptable multicollinearity. The model chi-square (159) was 283.1, the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) was 0.060 (90% confidence interval 0.051-0.069), the comparative fit index (CFI) was 0.94, the standardized root mean squared residual (SRMR) was 0.13, and the Tucker-Lewis fit index (TLI) was 0.90. These values represent a good fit of the model to the dataset as indicated by commonly reported fit statistics (RMSEA < 0.08, CFI ≥ 0.90, SRMR < 0.08, TLI ≥ 0.95)⁵³.

STUDY 2 – IONS Discovery Lab sample

Results

In total, 646 participants completed the surveys from March 17, 2018 through July 22, 2019 (underlying data⁵⁰). There were no missing data. Participants were on average 55.0 years old ± 13.3 with 17.4 ± 3.0 years of education, 75% female, 81% Caucasian, and 66% in relationship. In terms of income, 28% earned under $75,000, 16% between $75,000 and $100,000, 19% between $100,000 to $150,000, 15% between $150,000 to $250,000, and 12% above $250,000. The average household size was 2.3 ± 1.3.

The NEBS Belief items had a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.93 and an average inter-item covariance of 304.4. The NEBS Experience items had a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.91 and average inter-item covariance of 476.4. The experience scale was moderately correlated with the belief scale in this sample (Table 4).

Table 4 shows the correlations of NEBS Belief and Experience scale with the other measures administered. NEBS Belief had negligible correlations (r = 0 - 0.30) with all items according to Mukaka et al. criteria except for NEBS Experience⁶¹. NEBS Experience had negligible correlations (0 - 0.30) with all other scales (except NEBS Belief).

The same confirmatory factor analysis model developed through the general population data was applied to the IONS Discovery Lab dataset to evaluate its fit. The model chi-square (123) was 318.34, the RMSEA was 0.060 (90% confidence interval 0.052-0.068), the CFI was 0.85, the SRMR was 0.24, and the TLI was 0.77. These values demonstrate a good fit of the model to this new dataset and similar to the original dataset where RMSEA = 0.060, CFI = 0.94, SRMR = 0.13, and TLI = 0.90.

Discussion

The overall results of the two studies provide psychometric support for the validity and reliability of the NEBS as a brief assessment of self-reported paranormal beliefs and experiences. The participant demographics of study 1 reflected the general population of the United States as designated by the recruitment criteria. Construct validity of the NEBS Belief subscale was strong, as it was strongly correlated with multiple other scales measuring paranormal belief including the Australian Sheep Goat scale, the Psi, Spiritual and Precognition subscales of the Paranormal Belief Scale, and AEI Paranormal Belief subscale. Construct validity of the NEBS Experience subscale was also strong, demonstrating higher correlations to experience items such as AEI-Paranormal Experience and AEI-Paranormal Ability than other items such as Traditional Religious Beliefs. The NEBS did not measure paranormal fear or drug use as reflected in the low correlations on those AEI subscales. For divergent validity, there were only negligible correlations (r’s between 0 and 0.30) to all other measures, providing more evidence that the NEBS is not measuring other constructs. Interestingly, other studies evaluating personality traits and paranormal beliefs have been mixed^62,63, with some studies observing positive correlations with neuroticism^64,65 (unlike our study which found a negligible negative correlation) and others not finding any correlations^65–67. The NEBS reliability and internal consistency was also demonstrated through high Cronbach’s alphas for both subscales in two different samples. Our confirmatory factor analysis for two latent constructs of Belief and Experience in the general population dataset revealed a model good fit (RMSEA = 0.06), controlling for covariances between specific individual items, that was then confirmed with the IONS Discovery Lab sample (RMSEA = 0.06). RMSEA calculates the size of the standardized residual correlations and theoretically ranges from 0 (perfect fit) to 1 (poor fit). A model is considered satisfactory when RMSEA < 0.08^68,69. Our conceptual model of Belief and Experience as separate constructs and as evaluated through the NEBS was confirmed.

When measured separately, Belief and Experience are highly correlated. We found this in both of our samples (study 1: r =0.77; study 2: r = 0.64). Interestingly, the correlation was stronger in our general population sample that in our IONS Discovery Lab sample. The mean NEBS belief scores for the IONS Discovery Lab group were 21.3 points higher than the general population group (59.7 ± 21.9 general population vs. 81.0 ± 18.1 IONS Discovery Lab). The mean NEBS Experience scores were also greater in the IONS Discovery Lab group but only by 15.1 (44.3 ± 25.6 general population vs. 59.4 ± 22.9 IONS Discovery Lab). The AEI - Paranormal Belief and Paranormal Experience subscales were highly correlated in our study 1 sample as well (0.77). Interestingly, the original study of this scale found a much lower (r =0.57) although significant correlation between the two subscales²⁹. We also found belief and experience to be highly correlated (r = 0.61) for another mixed population of scientists and engineers, the general population, and paranormal enthusiasts¹². Other studies that have evaluated belief and experience in general have also found positive correlations^17,18. A study examining the correlation between specific religious and classic paranormal beliefs, such as belief in heaven and hell or psychic healing, in relation to the paranormal experiences of illness cured by prayer and the use of the mind to heal the body, found mixed results. For example, belief in the devil and belief in illness cured by prayer had a low significant correlation (r = 0.38), but the relationship between illness cured by prayer and the belief in psychic healing (r = -0.04) was not⁴⁰.

Paranormal belief and experience are highly correlated in most studies that assess them, and yet they are distinctly different constructs that should be evaluated separately. What we do not yet understand is the causal or temporal nature of the relationship between belief and experience. Does paranormal belief precede experience or vice versa? Does someone’s belief in the paranormal prime them to experiencing it or does a subjective experience of the paranormal instill belief in the phenomena? Future longitudinal studies evaluating a baseline level of people’s beliefs and collecting data on how those beliefs change over time in relation to any experiences they have would be helpful in answering this question.

There are a number of limitations that should be kept in mind when reviewing the results of this study. The individual constructs included in the NEBS are highly correlated. Conceptually, the individual concepts are unique but could also be viewed as overlapping. For example, the items on non-local consciousness (B2. I believe that my consciousness is not limited by my physical brain or body. E2. I have personally had this experience.) and survival of consciousness (B5. I believe in life after death. E5. I have personally had an experience that I interpreted as a proof that consciousness survives the physical body.) could be considered as the same construct worded in a different way. The experience items are administered directly after the belief item of the same construct. The instrument was purposefully designed in this way to keep it concise. However, asking the belief question directly before the experience question could bias responses to the experience question in some way. We also acknowledge that the limited objective format of the survey (answered with a slider from 0-100) with constrained definitions is limiting. A more in-depth phenomenological approach would surely provide greater nuance and depth of understanding of belief and experience. However, the nature of such an instrument in terms of administration and scoring would not solve the problem of needing a simple and concise instrument. Any NEBS results should be interpreted with these limitations in mind.

In summary, the NEBS is a 20-item survey rated on a sliding scale from 0-100, with 10 Belief and 10 Experience items. Both subscales demonstrated convergent validity, internal consistency, and test-retest reliability. A confirmatory factor analysis model demonstrated a good fit for Belief and Experience as separate latent variables. This model was confirmed in another sample where divergent validity was also established. The NEBS is a concise, valid, and reliable instrument for evaluating individual differences in paranormal beliefs and experiences. This measure provides a new tool for rigorously investigating these beliefs and experiences, and their relationship (as predictors, outcomes, or covariates) with other variables of interest such as psychological well-being, physical health, effects of interventions, coping with death and dying, grief and trauma resilience, and extended human capacities, just to name a few.

Data availability