The program that drew Maione’s wrath was one titled, “Put to the Test” and it
purported to investigate paranormal claims in an objective fashion.
The scholarly analysis of media responsibility for widespread paranormal belief is
predicated on the assumption that media messages about the paranormal have direct
effects on consumers of those messages. Maller and Lundeen expressed this view as
early as 1932, but it appears to have gained many more adherents after the explosive
growth of TV in the 1950s. Until very recently, the empirical evidence for the claim
of media influence on paranormal beliefs was almost nonexistent. A few researchers
reported results from surveys that indicated a tendency for respondents to cite media
stories as the primary reason for their belief in some paranormal claims (Alcock,
1981; Evans, 1973). And apparently, as many as fifty newspaper editors including
ones from The Los Angeles Times and The Indianapolis Star believe that their daily
horoscope columns might influence readers to believe in the accuracy of astrological
forecasts. These editors are among the few that publish disclaimers next to the daily
horoscope column (B. Karr, personal communication, April, 1993; also see Gersh,
1987).
The lack of empirical evidence to support the claim that media messages about the
paranormal influence paranormal beliefs is a state of affairs that holds considerable
potential to embarrass the scientific and skeptical community. Consider the fact that
while simultaneously blaming the media for promoting unproven ideas about the
paranormal, many scientists, philosophers and skeptics have little empirical evi-
dence to cite for their own claim of media impact in this domain. Avoiding this
potential embarrassment certainly constitutes a major practical reason for scholars to
take up rigorous study of the relationship between media exposure to messages
about the paranormal and paranormal beliefs. In addition to this practical reason,
there are obvious theoretical reasons for such investigation. While the literature on
television’s impact is dense with studies on media violence (see National Television
Violence Study, 1997), this density has produced gaps in understanding other kinds
of media effects. Recent movies like The Sixth Sense, Ghost, Dogma, and The Blair
Witch Project combined with a 1999 prime-time TV alignment that includes such
programs as Roswell, Charmed, Touched by an Angel, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and
Unsolved Mysteries, suggests that the prevalence of paranormal media content far
surpasses what might be expected in the scholarly literature regarding our understand-
ing of how such presentations affect audiences. Moreover, investigating this area
may lend insight into how individual members of the audience use this type of media
in their overall diet of entertainment.
Earlier in this decade, Sparks, Hansen and Shah (1994) published the first study in
a line of investigations (see Sparks, 1998) about the relationship between exposure to
paranormal media and paranormal beliefs. In a laboratory experiment, these
authors manipulated the nature of a disclaimer that was presented before subjects
viewed the program, Beyond Reality. This program appeared regularly on the USA
network along with the claim at the outset that the scenes depicted in the show were
based on actual reports. Subjects in the study who heard disclaimers that emphasized
the fictional or impossible nature of the show’s content were significantly less likely
to endorse paranormal beliefs after the program than subjects who heard no
disclaimer at all. In a second experiment, Sparks, Sparks, & Gray (1995) found that
subjects who viewed a program depicting UFOs (unidentified flying objects) tended
to increase their belief in the existence of UFOs from outer space. A third
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experiment (Sparks, Pellechia, & Irvine, 1998) exposed subjects to one of two
different segments from a news program about UFOs. The segments differed
according to the extent to which a scientific authority challenged the view that the
alleged flying saucers were actually visitors from outer space. Subjects who viewed
the story that included the challenge from scientific authority decreased their beliefs
in UFOs; subjects who viewed the story that included no such challenge increased
their beliefs. A fourth experiment (Sparks & Pellechia, 1997) investigated the role of
a scientific authority in a magazine story about UFOs. Once again, the results
showed that subjects expressed different UFO beliefs depending upon whether or
not a scientist endorsed the existence of UFOs.
In addition to this small group of experiments, Sparks, Nelson, and Campbell
(1997) reported the findings from a random sample survey of 120 respondents living
in a mid-sized city in the Midwest. Their results showed that, as predicted, there was
a significant relationship between exposure to TV programs that featured paranor-
mal content and paranormal beliefs. These authors had predicted that in accord with
the “resonance” hypothesis from cultivation theory (Gerbner, Gross, Morgan, &
Signorielli, 1994), the relationship between TV exposure involving the paranormal
and belief in the paranormal should be more likely among respondents who
reported having a personal experience with the paranormal. According to the
theory, resonance results when media consumers get a “double-dose” of the same
message—media consumption and personal experience both communicate the same
reality. In such a case, the influence of the media message is thought to be even
greater. However, Sparks et al. found no evidence for resonance in their study. In
fact, the exact opposite finding emerged. The relationship between media exposure
to the paranormal and paranormal beliefs was present only among respondents who
reported that they had never had a paranormal experience.
In this paper, we were interested in continuing the investigation of potential media
impact on paranormal beliefs by extending the available survey data on this topic.
Following Sparks, et al. (1997), we examined the relationship between television
exposure and paranormal beliefs through a larger random-sample telephone survey
in the same mid-sized city in the Midwest. Of course, the survey method does not
permit definitive statements about causal relationships, but it does permit generaliza-
tion beyond a small sample and enables insight about the prevalence of paranormal
beliefs and their relationship to TV consumption. In this case, we proceeded with the
present study for two primary reasons. First, we were particularly interested in
revisiting the resonance hypothesis in order to see if the earlier disconfirmation
could be replicated. Such a study seems to be called for given the fact that evidence
for the resonance hypothesis has appeared in other areas of investigation and there
appears to be a clear theoretical rationale for its support in the study by Sparks, et al.
(1997). Second, the study of the relationship between media consumption and
paranormal beliefs is a fledgling line of investigation. Even a single replication of
results from an existing survey goes a considerable distance in building confidence
that the initial results are not statistical anomalies.
Given our interest in carrying out a replication of the earlier survey by Sparks et al.
(1997), our general theoretical approach to this study, like that of the prior survey,
calls upon the theory of media cultivation. According to this perspective, exposure
to TV programming presents a particular reality about the world that is gradually
adopted by viewers as an accurate representation of the world (Gerbner, Gross,
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