Professor Christopher French

BA PhD CPsychol FBPsS FRSA

Psychology of paranormal beliefs and of ostensibly paranormal experiences.

Grants & awards

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MEMORY FOR PSYCHIC READINGS AND PARANORMAL BELIEF
£32324 (subject to revision in light of any increase in academic pay scales) from the Perrott-Warrick Committee to fund one-year junior lectureship to relieve me of teaching and administrative duties for one year and to work collaboratively on the above project.

CLINICIANS’ BELIEFS ABOUT CHILDHOOD ABUSE, MEMORY AND HYPNOSIS
£9200 from the Odin Trust. Application submitted jointly with Dr James Ost, Dr Lorraine Hope, Mr Simon Easton (Portsmouth) and Dr Daniel Wright (Sussex). Dr Ost named as Principal Applicant. Awarded April 2006.

AN INVESTIGATION OF DOWSING
£1472 from the Society for Psychical Research. Application submitted jointly with Dr Elaine Beattie. Awarded August 2006.

French, C. Psychological and parapsychological investigations of alleged alien abductees: Phase 1. Bial Foundation. €36000 (£23.5K approx). (Nov. 2002).

Haque, U. HAUNT. Sciart. £14,985. (French, C. as scientific adviser).

Allan, K., French, C. & Gabbert, F. On the relationship between reality monitoring and belief in parapsychological phenomena: Neurophysiological studies. Bial Foundation. €45,080 (£28K approx). (Nov. 2004).

CLINICIANS’ BELIEFS ABOUT CHILDHOOD ABUSE, MEMORY AND HYPNOSIS
£9200 from the Odin Trust. Application submitted jointly with Dr James Ost, Dr Lorraine Hope, Mr Simon Easton (Portsmouth) and Dr Daniel Wright (Sussex). Dr Ost named as Principal Applicant. Awarded April 2006. 

AN INVESTIGATION OF DOWSING
£1472 from the Society for Psychical Research. Application submitted jointly with Dr Elaine Beattie. Awarded August 2006. 

EXPLORING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SUSCEPTIBILITY TO FALSE MEMORIES AND BELIEF IN AND EXPERIENCE OF THE PARANORMAL
£34103 grant application to the Bial Foundation to fund RA for one year. Application submitted jointly with Krissy Wilson. Prof French named as Project Leader. 

TELEPHONE TELEPATHY
£6K (private donation). In collaboration with Dr Rupert Sheldrake. 

BEYOND TELEPHONE TELEPATHY
£6K grant application to the Perrott Warrick Committee, primarily to fund RA for two months.

PERSON-ENVIRONMENT FIT, PSYCHOLOGICAL HEALTH AND SLEEP PARALYSIS: A CROSS-CULTURAL INVESTIGATION
£4K grant from British Academy/National Science Council, Taipei (Grants for British-Taiwan Joint Projects), with Dr A Richards, Dr Y-C Hsia and Dr Hsu. Awarded May 2009. 

HAUNT II: FURTHER INVESTIGATIONS OF POSSIBLE ENVIRONMENTAL CAUSES OF HAUNT-TYPE EXPERIENCES
£35K awarded to fund “Haunt II” project by the Perrott-Warrick Committee, August 2010. (This was in response to an application for £170,379.59 to appoint temporary lecturer in anomalistic psychology and to support Haunt II project). Funding to be taken up for academic year 2011/12.

Research interests

My main research interest is the psychology of paranormal beliefs and of ostensibly paranormal experiences. Although a large proportion of the population believes in the paranormal, the evidence presented to support paranormal claims is generally not very convincing in scientific terms. It would appear that on most (and perhaps all) occasions when individuals claim to have directly experienced the paranormal, plausible non-paranormal alternative explanations can be found. These alternative accounts often rely on the imperfections in human information-processing studied by cognitive psychologists, such as those related to memory, perception, and judgement. The psychology of deception and self-deception is also of relevance in this area. I often appear on the television and radio offering a sceptical perspective on a variety of paranormal claims. I also edit The Skeptic magazine and write columns for the Guardian’s online science pages. In 2001, I set up the Anomalistic Psychology Research Unit within the Department to act as a focus for research in this area. You can find out more about the Unit's activities by checking out the website at http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk/apru/ In total I have authored or co-authored over one hundred articles and chapters on these and other topics, and I have co-edited four books.

Selected publications