Are There Really More Pandemic Ghosts?
What do you mean I'm not the only ghost researcher whose inbox has been flooded with ghost reports?
There is a lot of discussion online about paranormal activity having increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. What’s really going on here, and what aren’t the headline grabbing claims telling us?
In the two weeks that followed the UK government announcing lockdown measures in a bid to halt the spread of COVID-19, I received a number of emails from people about weird, spooky things that they were experiencing or had caught on camera. More than I would normally receive in the same time-frame. At the time, I tweeted about this and asked other people who research ghost phenomena if they were experiencing the same. A number of people reported that they were receiving more reports too. I thought nothing more of it as I had other pressing issues to deal with, such as a fast-approaching uni deadline to focus on. However, the discussions of this nature have been ongoing, with some people even talking about increased paranormal activity at this time of crisis as though it’s just a fact of nature.
As the world deals with this pandemic, a lot of people are dealing with extreme changes to their lives. A lot of us are stuck at home, under great stress, may have lost people that we love and care about to the virus. People are likely not eating properly, increasing alcohol and/or drug intake, and their sleep habits have been disturbed. I know my sleep has! As someone who has been communicating with people who think they’re haunted since I was a teenage ghost hunter, it doesn’t surprise me that with everything people are going through right now, some people are feeling more spooked than usual. However, rather than pondering what might be stirring up supernatural energies during this crisis - something which I believe to be largely unhelpful to everybody - ghost enthusiasts would do well to look for more rational causes a bit closer to home.
Firstly, it strikes me that the people reporting paranormal activity increases during the pandemic are largely people who already believe in ghosts or already believe their homes to be haunted by ghosts. As such, these individuals are likely predisposed to notice meaning where there may be none, and more likely to interpret everyday occurrences as spooky and significant. Those I have been communicating with about their increased ghostly activity are not wholly concerned about what is happening in their home, and talk about their ghosts as though they’re just part of the family. In some cases, the ghosts are considered to have been family, which I imagine must be quite comforting, especially during a crisis.
Not only this, but as we all traverse these unusual times we are exposed to varying levels of stress that we wouldn’t normally have to deal with. Suddenly, a trip to the shop to get bread could be a matter of life and death depending on the social-distancing habits of those around us. It’s unnerving, isn’t it? For your fate to be so obviously in the hands of others and not completely in your control. There is some evidence to suggest that disruption to psychological processes, psychological stress, perceptions of danger, or a lack of change in a person’s environments (such as being stuck at home) may cause changes in cognitive processes and, due to the sudden lack of external stimuli, people start to focus more within themselves instead as a coping mechanism. This, it is suggested, can lead to sensed presences around us.1
There is also a chance that the apparent increase in paranormal activity reports are a result of the Availability Heuristic. For those who don’t know, a Heuristic is a type of mental shortcut that we use to efficiently make sense of incoming information, but which can lead to judgement errors. The Availability Heuristic specifically refers to how people judge the frequency or likelihood of something based on how available to them examples of it are.2 I think it’s possible that it might seem as though there has been an increase in reports of paranormal activity because other people are talking about paranormal activity more.
For example, in recent weeks, I have been inundated with messages and emails from writers and journalists who are all researching paranormal-themed articles. This includes a DevonLive article which discusses my 2016 investigation of Torquay museum for no apparent newsworthy reason. Paranormal topics are always good for filling newspaper inches and generating clicks through to media websites so this doesn’t surprise me.
I also consider the role of the Availability Heuristic because when I asked my ghost research friends and followers if they’d seen a rise in the number of reports being sent to them, a lot of the replies I received were from people who wanted me to hear about the weird things that happen in their homes instead. Those who believe they are haunted are often more than happy to tell you about it, which is fine, but it does mean that there’s a chance that those telling you that more paranormal activity is happening during lockdown are basing this claim on nothing more than eagerly shared ghost stories and not ecologically valid data.
When it comes to the claims about an increase in paranormal reports, we hear about those researchers who have experienced an increase but we do not hear as much from those who haven’t and, ultimately, it’s important to remember that although individual researchers may receive an increase in paranormal reports, this doesn’t indicate anything other than that individual receiving an increase in reports.
Life is currently weird enough without ghost enthusiasts adding unsubstantiated claims to the mix. Are there really more pandemic ghosts? I hope this post makes clear that there are bigger questions to consider before reaching such conclusions.
Suedfeld, P. & Mocellin, J. S. P. (1987) ‘The “sensed presence” in unusual environments’ Environment and Behavior, vol. 19, pp. 33-52.
Kahneman, D. and Tversky, A. (1973) ‘On the Psychology of Prediction’, Psychological Review, vol. 80, pp.237-51.