Follow-up on the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) remote viewing experiments

Abstract

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The U.S. CIA commissioned research on remote viewing (RV) from 1972, which was declassified between 1995 and 2003. The main goals were to replicate initial findings and explore the cognitive mechanisms involved, particularly focusing on emotional intelligence (EI) and intuitive processing.

Using a quasi-experimental design with statistical methods like structural equation modeling and forced-choice experiments, 634 participants (believers and nonbelievers in psychic phenomena) were tested on RV tasks based on either location coordinates or place images. Results showed that while one group had no significant outcomes, the second group indicated a significant positive link between EI and RV success (19.5% predictability), with moderate effect sizes.

The findings suggest emotions may influence anomalous cognition during RV, leading to the proposal of the Production-Identification-Comprehension (PIC) emotional model to improve RV test results.