Psychophysiological Thought Reading

[Azucena Jewels]

This is a guest post by Arts and Humanities Research Council Fellow Stuart Nolan, of Lancaster University in the UK. His research at the Kluge Center looks at the influence of New Thought on theatrical mentalism.

I recently ran a workshop at the Kluge Center that explored the techniques of the 19th Century stage performers, known as thought-readers or muscle-readers. The workshop was on May the Fourth, an appropriate day to learn Jedi mind tricks.

The second exercise we used demonstrates a physical movement that is subliminal for the participant: moving a pendulum with the imagination. I always use simple pendulums made from a paperclip on the end of a piece of cotton thread rather than something you would buy from a hippy emporium as this is a demonstration of physiology and I want to avoid any trappings of mysticism.

First, hold the pendulum by the thread and let it hang free. Now touch the arm of your chair with the paperclip. Move it around a little and explore the surface of the arm of the chair. Notice that you can sense the surface that the paperclip is touching almost as though you are touching it with your hand.

Why does this happen? Common Coding Theory is a contemporary cognitive psychology theory describing how our perceptual representations of things we can see and our representations of physical movements are linked. The theory claims that there is a shared representation, a common code, for both perception and action. Performing an action activates the associated perceptual event and, more importantly for what we are doing, seeing an event or imagining an event activates the action associated with that event.

Common Coding Theory suggests that the same neurological and motor processes will deal with doing something, thinking about doing that thing, and watching someone else do that thing. You will get the same physical response in each of these instances but at different intensities.

One person from each pair is asked to leave the room, they will be the receiver. While they are away their partner, the sender, makes a simple drawing on a piece of paper then hides this target drawing. The receiver comes back into the room and holds a pencil on a fresh piece of paper. The sender holds their wrist and visualizes their target drawing, thinking about which way the pencil should move to recreate it. The receiver gently moves the pencil around trying to sense which way the sender wants them to go, they will find less resistance in that direction.

Having explored the ideomotor response and played a mindreading drawing game, participants are now ready to learn the stage technique that made 19th-century muscle readers both famous and controversial.

A popular use of muscle reading in a stage performance was for the performer to find an object that had been hidden in the theatre by holding the wrist of an audience member who had hidden it and asking them to merely think of the location of the object. This has been the basis of the successful careers of mentalists from J. Randall Brown to the present day. You will notice that this is very similar to the technique we used earlier for duplicating drawings but finding an object in a room is easier because the movements involve the whole body and so can be made larger and felt more easily.

Watching a group of people perform this exercise is like watching an exceedingly slow and stately dance. Participants are intensely focussed on listening and speaking with their whole bodies. They describe the experience as somehow both relaxing and tense at the same time.

These blogs are governed by the general rules of respectful civil discourse. By commenting on our blogs, you are fully responsible for everything that you post. The content of all comments is released into the public domain unless clearly stated otherwise. The Library of Congress does not control the content posted. Nevertheless, the Library of Congress may monitor any user-generated content as it chooses and reserves the right to remove content for any reason whatever, without consent. Gratuitous links to sites are viewed as spam and may result in removed comments. We further reserve the right, in our sole discretion, to remove a user's privilege to post content on the Library site. Read our Comment and Posting Policy.

Links to external Internet sites on Library of Congress Web pages do not constitute the Library's endorsement of the content of their Web sites or of their policies or products. Please read our Standard Disclaimer.

The site is secure.

The ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Recent event-related brain potential (ERP) experiments have demonstrated parafoveal N400 expectancy and congruity effects, showing that semantic information can be accessed from words in parafoveal vision (a conclusion also supported by some eye-tracking work). At the same time, it is unclear how higher-order integrative aspects of language comprehension unfold across the visual field during reading. In the current study, we recorded ERPs in a parafoveal flanker paradigm, while readers were instructed to read passively for comprehension or to judge the plausibility of sentences in which target words varied in their semantic expectancy and congruity. We directly replicated prior work showing graded N400 effects for parafoveal viewing, which are then not duplicated when the target words are processed foveally. Critically, although N400 effects were not modulated by task goals, a posteriorly distributed late positive component thought to reflect semantic integration processes was observed to semantic incongruities only in the plausibility judgment task. However, this effect was observed at a considerable delay, appearing only after words had moved into foveal vision. Our findings thus suggest that semantic access can be initiated in parafoveal vision, whereas central foveal vision may be necessary to enact higher-order (and task-dependent) integrative processing.

We are proud to highlight the following books, published by AABP members (separately and independently of AAPB). Focused on concepts of self-regulation, well-being and scientific foundations of biofeedback in all its forms, books featured here are AAPB Publications committee-reviewed and deemed relevant, recommended reading for members of our professional community. In some cases, featured Authors extend a discount to AAPB members. Member discounts apply where noted.

Featuring a 6-page personal guide and assessment to support you on your journey, The 9 Pillars of Resilience makes it simple to establish lifelong physical, emotional, and mental patterns for mastering stress, increasing longevity, and living a joyful, balanced life.

Richard A. Sherman, PhD

This text provides the skills professionals and students need to read the applied psychophysiological literature intelligently and to perform studies in applied psychophysiology. It covers the basic steps and timeline of an applied psychophysiology project from initial conceptualization through analysis of the data. It includes steps in formulating and maturing a question, research ethics, background and literature searches, methods of determining a project's feasibility and, common methods for analyzing the data. The logic and progression of study designs used to evaluate the efficacy of applied psychophysiologically oriented studies is detailed and exemplified. Topics include single subject and single group designs - cohorts, multiple group designs, strengths and weaknesses of longitudinal and cross-sectional studies, prospective experimental vs. observational and retrospective designs. Readers will learn about the strengths and weaknesses of such techniques as quantitative analysis, meta-analysis, time series analysis, and population-based data analysis. The text includes information on research protocol design, the consent form, and the protocol review process including subject selection techniques (sampling, inclusion-exclusion, etc.), kinds of data (dichotomous, nominal, ordinal, continuous, etc.), techniques for hardening subjective data, validity and reliability, survey and questionnaire design, as well as pilot studies and the initial power analysis.

by Inna Khazan, PhD

This practical guide to the clinical use of biofeedback, integrating powerful mindfulness techniques is a definitive desk reference for the use of peripheral biofeedback techniques in psychotherapeutic settings, backed by a wealth of clinical research. Dr. Khazan's guide offers:

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

In the present study, we investigated whether inter-individual differences in vagally-mediated cardiac activity (high frequency heart rate variability, HF-HRV) would be associated with inter-individual differences in mind-reading, a specific aspect of social cognition. To this end, we recorded resting state HF-HRV in 49 individuals before they completed the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test, a test that required the identification of mental states on basis of subtle facial cues. As expected, inter-individual differences in HF-HRV were associated with inter-individual differences in mental state identification: Individuals with high HF-HRV were more accurate in the identification of positive but not negative states than individuals with low HF-HRV. Individuals with high HF-HRV may, thus, be more sensitive to positive states of others, which may increase the likelihood to detect cues that encourage approach and affiliative behavior in social contexts. Inter-individual differences in mental state identification may, thus, explain why individuals with high HF-HRV have been shown to be more successful in initiating and maintaining social relationships than individuals with low HF-HRV.

3a8082e126