Tested, contested

Mediumship

Mediumship is the claimed ability of receiving information from people who have died. It has been tested — Beischel and Schwartz, 2007, and later work at the Windbridge Institute. Some studies report scoring above chance; the samples are small, the mediums self-selected, and independent replication outside the same group is thin.

The experiment

Beischel and Schwartz, 2007, and later work at the Windbridge Institute

How it was run Quintuple-blind: the reader never meets the sitter, does not know their name, and the experimenter scoring the transcript does not know which sitter it belongs to. Sitters then score two transcripts without being told which is theirs.
Sample Eight mediums, small sitter pools — usually under 60 readings per study
Result Some studies report scoring above chance; the samples are small, the mediums self-selected, and independent replication outside the same group is thin.

This is the most carefully designed corner of the field. It is also the one where the experimenters and the practitioners are closest, which is exactly the condition under which effects tend to shrink in outside hands.

Claim Receiving information from people who have died
Status Tested, contested
Searched 247,300/mo

Where the word comes from

The modern sense dates to the Spiritualist movement of the 1850s, when a "medium" meant the channel between the living and the dead.

Terms in this field are younger than they sound. Most were coined between 1840 and 1930, in the Spiritualist and Theosophical revivals, and then presented as ancient. Dating them is the cheapest reality check available.

The other 10

Clairvoyance Telepathy Precognition Clairsentience Clairaudience Psychometry Psychic empathy Astral projection Psychic healing Aura reading

All eleven, with what was tested →