Rosa Rubicondior: Wacky Woo News - The Loopy Things People Can Be Made To Believe

Wacky Woo News

The Loopy Things People Can Be Made To Believe

Starseeds: psychologists on why some people think they're aliens living on Earth

P.T. Barnum, the 'Greatest Showman' and half-owner of Barnum & Bailey Circus reputedly said, "There's a sucker born every minute".

Sometimes though, especially reading the comments of Creationists and religious fundamentalist in the social media, that would seem to be on the conservative side, with tens, or even hundreds, of millions apparently believing in magic and evil demons; that evidence is forged; that scientists are all evil, mad and part of a vast conspiracy; that reality is an illusion, but not to them, and that inerrant knowledge just pops itself into their brain if they have an open mind, so the best expertise comes from pristine ignorance. I've even had a Creationist tell me that Jesus tells him what to believe, curiously, it always coincides with what Ken Ham tells him to believe.

So what is the psychology behind these wackadoodle fantasy beliefs, other than the acute manifestations of clinical psychosis?

Part of the explanation involves the Forer Effect, after the psychologist who described it, also known as the Barnum Effect after P.T.Barnum. Basically, the Forar Effect is the tendency to believe that information provided about our personalities is about us regardless of its generalisability.

In one experiment, Forar's students were give a personality test and told they would each receive feedback in the form of a personalised assessment by Forar himself. However, they all received exactly the same 'feedback' in the form of a paragraph full of generalised statements such as:

You tend to be critical of yourself.
Security is one of your major goals in life.
At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision.

The students were then asked to rate the assessment for accuracy on a scale of 0 to 5 with 0=poor and 5=perfect.

The mean score for the class was 4.3. In other words, the majority of students thought Forar's generalised statements were accurate descriptions of their personality.

The Forar effect works because we tend to like positive statements about ourselves, especially if they flatter our ego. In particular, we have preferences for:

Likeability.
Predictions are more likely to be accepted as accurate if we like what's being predicted, and being more socially desirable feeds are ego, and plays to our social affiliative needs.
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.

Source
Relatability.
We prefer statements which are relevant to our lives, so we can readily relate to them. Statements which match our expectations or desires are more likely to be accepted as true.
The Pollyanna Principle
The Pollyanna Principle, or positivity bias, is the bias for pleasant events rather than unpleasant ones. So, we are more likely to remember positive experiences in greater detail than negative experiences and enjoy recalling them. Similarly, we have a preference for positive statements about ourselves and enjoy hearing them.
Barnum Statements.
Barnum statements are vague generalisations which can apply to all of us in their generality, but which seem to relate specifically to us. Examples are:
- You have a great deal of unused capacity that you have not turned to your advantage yet.
- Something that you have been waiting for will happen shortly, and you will feel more confident.
- There are so many people around you who are waiting for you to open your eyes and find them.
- You critically analyse yourself in your duties.
- You are often very good at compensating for your weaknesses.
- Fairness is a core value for you.
These vague statements are the stuff of horoscopes, on the subject of which, 90% of Americans know their star sign and 50% admit to reading their horoscopes and moreover, believe what they read!

That was by way of an introduction to an article by Ken Drinkwater, Senior Lecturer and Researcher in Cognitive and Parapsychology, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK, Andrew Denovan, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, University of Huddersfield, UK, and Neil Dagnall, Reader in Applied Cognitive Psychology, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK, explaining the psychology behind the latest fad of claiming to be a 'Starseed', or an alien life form put on Earth to 'save' us in some magical way, and believing those claims.

The subjects are invariably otherwise perfectly normal people whose natural birth will have been recorded, but who nevertheless have managed to convince others and even themselves that something magical was involved which included implanting a 'seed' in the developing foetus so that there is an alien living inside their body.

These individuals have been proliferating in the social media and building following of credulous dupes, who are 'influenced' to buy goods and services for which the 'starseed' gets commission.

The article is reprinted here under a Creative Commons license. It has been reformatted for stylistic consistency. The original can be read here.

Published: March 13, 2023 4.38pm GMT

Starseeds: psychologists on why some people think they’re aliens living on Earth

Welcome to the new reality.

sun ok/Shutterstock

Ken Drinkwater, Manchester Metropolitan University; Andrew Denovan, University of Huddersfield, and Neil Dagnall, Manchester Metropolitan University

There’s a new group of people on Earth who believe they’re aliens. Star people, or starseeds, are individuals who believe they have come to Earth from other dimensions to help heal the planet and guide humanity into the “golden age” – a period of great happiness, prosperity and achievement.

It might sound a little crazy but an internet search for the term brings up over 4 million results and there are scores of people posting videos on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook who believe they originate from another world. Indeed, content with the term #starseed has over 1 billion views on TikTok.

Unlike “Earth souls”, who are said to reincarnate on Earth, starseeds believe they have reawakened from another planet to be born here. Starseeds believe they are conduits between divine realms and the Earth and that they can transport between galaxies via meditation. Starseeds also believe they can communicate in “light language” – a form of communication that is said to bypass human limitations and be the language of the soul.

The idea is widely credited to the author Brad Steiger who wrote prolifically about the unknown and was keenly interested in alien life and extraterrestrials. In his 1976 book, Gods of Aquarius, Steiger introduced his notion that some people originate from other dimensions.

Believers claim there are several ways to tell if you are a starseed. These include searching for meaning in life and feeling a lack of belonging. Being spiritual and possessing a strong sense of intuition (knowing) are also qualities of a starseed.

They are also said to be empathetic, sensitive and have more physical and mental health issues as their souls aren’t used to having a human body. Starseeds want to help humanity. But they get overwhelmed by life on Earth and so recharge by spending time alone.

Believers also say that starseeds have the desire to explore and experience new cultures and spheres, which help star people to then provide novel insights into existence. Examples include new (conspiracy) theories about society, holistic health interventions along with thoughts on ancient aliens and civilisations.

Choose your reality

You might recognise some aspects of yourself in the above description. Many people, for example, report searching for meaning in life along with feeling displaced or like they don’t belong at times.

Indeed, research shows that a low sense of belonging is often linked to depression. But what makes some people who are experiencing such feelings jump to the conclusion that they must be from another planet? Particularly given that no life beyond Earth has ever been found and there is no evidence that alien life has ever visited Earth.

Welcome to the Forer effect. Named after Bertram Forer, the psychologist who first figured out that it was pretty easy to get people to agree with vague descriptions about themselves – see horoscopes.

The concept of starseeds is a form of new age belief. The term refers to alternative spiritual practices that developed during the 1970s.

Although each new age belief is different, philosophies share common features: they view existence in terms of the universe and focus on spirituality as well as the self. Think crystals, energy healing and psychic abilities.

Other features include reincarnation, karma and the possibility of reaching a higher level of consciousness.

Support for new age beliefs – such as starseeds – is on the rise. It comes from a distrust of science and doubts about conventional perceptions of reality. Particularly, cynicism about modern society and an attempt to find meaning in life.

Fantasy v fiction

Certain personality characteristics may also incline some people to believe in the notion of starseeds. For instance, if you are fantasy prone and often confuse imaginary and real events you may see the theory of alien consciousness as profound and desirable.

In psychological terms, this is known as a source monitoring error, which is a type of unconscious memory error whereby a person gets confused between what’s real and accurate and what’s unreal and imagined.

It’s commonly seen in schizophrenia and research has found links between schizotypal personality disorder – a common disorder considered to be a mild form of schizophrenia – and belief in conspiracy theories.

Starseeds claim they are alien consciousness living on earth.

A further effect that can encourage such beliefs is what’s known as ontological confusion. This occurs when people cannot discriminate between metaphorical and factual statements such as: “Old furniture knows things about the past.” These may be interpreted more literally than metaphorically and so make it more likely that people then endorse pseudoscientific, transcendental theories.

This is especially true when the source of the information is perceived to be trustworthy and knowledgeable. Dubbed the Einstein effect, this is where trusted sources of information are given more credence because of the social credibility they possess.

In the case of starseeds, several books published by big publishing houses may provide a sense of authenticity and so too does the fact that a number of them are bestsellers. Indeed, it seems life as we know it, may not be as straightforward as we once imagined.
Ken Drinkwater, Senior Lecturer and Researcher in Cognitive and Parapsychology, Manchester Metropolitan University; Andrew Denovan, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, University of Huddersfield, and Neil Dagnall, Reader in Applied Cognitive Psychology, Manchester Metropolitan University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Published by The Conversation.
Open access. (CC BY 4.0)

Given that a significant number of otherwise hight-functioning individuals can be induced to believe in almost any wacky-woo nonsense such as this, it’s hardly surprising that they can believe equally implausible religious claims for no better reason than that their parents and authority figures in their culture believe them and tell them it is normal to believe them, and even a sign of abnormality not to.

And yet there is as much, or as little, evidence to support religious beliefs as there are to believe aliens have planted their seeds in a few 'chosen' people on Earth and have taken possession of their bodies. And of course, there is always a priesthood of some description standing there open-handed and always in need of more money.

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Sunday, 19 March 2023

Wacky Woo News - The Loopy Things People Can Be Made To Believe

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