Mentalism is a thing. Mentalists are performers who dazzle the audience by staging and executing incredible mental or intuitive feats. Their techniques are so developed that a good mentalist will give the impression of performing divination, precognition, mind-reading, mind control, mediumship, psychokinesis, telepathy, hypnosis, and many other unusual mind-related acts.
Of course, like with any illusionist, mentalists are stage artists who play on the spectator’s senses and perception to execute their tricks. The idea is to entertain, and a good mentalist will operate under the understanding you know that. They don’t really read your mind, although their intuition might be extraordinary indeed.
Psychics, on the other hand, are more like con-artists who expect you to authentically and intimately buy what they tell you. They are not entertainers, but deceivers. Psychics are at best dishonest mentalists, illusionists in disguise, and at worst, charlatans with no special skills except those of a conman. Either way, they make a living by deception and deceit, preying on emotionally vulnerable people who’re willing to believe almost anything to ease their pain or burden.
The Barnum Effect
Consider your typical psychic reading. A psychic will often say things like “I’m sensing you’re a determined person, though sometimes you’re very critical of yourself.” A series of such claims will draw you in, as you’ll find yourself agreeing they apply to you. Thing is, they’d apply to pretty much everyone else too.
That’s called The Barnum Effect (aka The Forer Effect), and it’s a very common phenomenon.
In 1947, psychologist Ross Stagner asked personnel managers to take a personality test. Afterwards, Stagner gave them what seemed to be feedback based on the test, when in reality it was a generalized feedback, based mostly on horoscopes, that had absolutely no relation whatsoever to any of the managers’ individual answers. Each of them was then asked how accurate the feedback was, and, unsurprisingly, most answered it was pretty accurate, with virtually none of them claiming it was wrong. Horoscopes and psychic readings apply to most everyone, but most people believe they are tailored for themselves.
One year after Stagner’s feat, another psychologist, Bertram R. Forer, performed a different experiment which has since become widely famous. Forer presented a psychology test to 39 of his students, and told them each would receive a personality profile based on their answers. So, one week later, Forer provided his students with the results of their test, asking them to rate how accurate they thought their “individualized” profile actually was.
In fact, the students all got the exact same generic profile, based on an astrology book. The profile read:
1. You have a great need for other people to like and admire you.
2. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself.
3. You have a great deal of unused capacity which you have not turned to your advantage.
4. While you have some personality weaknesses, you are generally able to compensate for them.
5. Your sexual adjustment has presented problems for you.
6. Disciplined and self-controlled outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure inside.
7. At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing.
8. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations.
9. You pride yourself as an independent thinker and do not accept others’ statements without satisfactory proof.
10. You have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others.
11. At times you are extroverted, affable, sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary, reserved.
12. Some of your aspirations tend to be pretty unrealistic.
13. Security is one of your major goals in life.
What do you think? How would you have rated it? The results would obviously be different if the students had known in advance that the test was a fake. But as it turns out, the vast majority of them rated it as right on the mark.
These kinds of experiments have been repeated over and over ever since, and every time the outcome is the same. Everyone, whether they admit it or not, is vulnerable to this sort of gullibility, and the more willing you are to believe in psychics, the more easily you’ll fall prey to their tricks.
Most of the time, psychics simply tell you want you want to hear. Their readings tend to be mostly positive, with a few minor negative features thrown in to make it more believable. Generic vague statements work like a charm in this regard. Ask a psychic to give you specifics, and they’ll stumble; but buy into their general statements, and they’ll thrive.
You do their work for them
But that’s not all psychics have in their bag of tricks. Psychics, just like mentalists, can be really good at making you give them essential information without even realizing it. And it’s easy for them to get you to play along. They will often claim they are getting “confusing messages,” and that they need your help interpreting them or clearing them up.
“I’m getting something here—a letter. It seems like the letter M. Oh, it’s N? Of course, it’s N. I see a name that starts with that letter. It’s someone close to you, or that once meant something to you. Nathaly, you say? Yes, it’s all becoming clearer.”
Since the client is so willing to believe from the beginning, they never even realize the’ve done most of the work for the psychic anyway. If a psychic ever makes a mistake, it’s easy to correct it by blaming it on the confusing nature of the signals they’re getting, or on the fact that it’s always a hit and miss when it comes to the “spiritual world.”
People-reading vs mind-reading
But one of perhaps the most valuable tools both psychics and mentalist have is their own ability to read others. Not to read minds, but people. They watch for subtle reactions and expressions, they notice small movements and body language, and they build up on that. Psychics will usually leave some time to see how a client responds to any of their statements. Are they getting nervous, anxious, upset, happy? All these signals allow psychics and mentalists alike to know whether they’re on the right track or not.
Take, for example, Keith Barry’s famous Ted Talk about “Brain Magic.” Barry is an Irish mentalist, and by using amazing people-reading skills, he manages to guess the name of a woman’s ex just by reading her body language and reactions, without her saying almost anything at all. Of course, Barry doesn’t claim to have supernatural powers. He’s just a performer who knows what he’s doing. Unlike him, psychics use the exact same tricks but do claim to have psychic powers, which is outright wrong.
Barry’s video is really worth it, by the way. There’s some mind-blowing tricks there—all of which are, however, just that: tricks.
There are several other skills a psychic might develop in order to fool their clients. Doing some research ahead of time, for instance, or managing some Sherlock Holmes guesswork by detecting clues in your outfit or accessories. Whatever they end up actually doing, rest assured there’s nothing supernatural about it—just illusionists in disguise.
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