Psychical EES/EHES Record Type: Review   ID: 978
Poltergeists Gauld, Alan, & Cornell, A.D.
The authors, two British parapsychologists, have aimed this book at the general reader but it should be very useful to parapsychologists as well. Part I is by Cornell and "is a survey of representative cases of poltergeists and hauntings" (p. ix). His intent was to select as many different kinds of well-authenticated cases as possible. Also included is a statistical analysis of 500 sample cases. Based on this analysis, a proposed classification of the cases is presented. Both authors contributed to Part II, in which they describe their own case investigations and discuss their findings and theories. They consider alternative explanations that can account for some, but not all, of the cases. One chapter is devoted to some poltergeists they have studied and another to some haunts they investigated. In the last two chapters they "discuss some of the main theories of the nature and causes of poltergeist phenomena" (p. 319). The last chapter is devoted to the question of whether poltergeists are living or dead. An Appendix to Part I consists of a "Chronological List of 500 Cases, with Sources and Case Characteristics." The list is to make it possible for anyone interested in a specific case to locate the original printed sources and to provide data for those interested in carrying out their own statistical analyses.
Publisher Information:	Boston, MA: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979. 406p. Case index: 399-401; Citations in text; 1 graph; 16 illustrations; Name index: 403-406; 3 tables

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