FIRST HAND PRIMARY RESEARCH

“The Architecture of Horror” survey was completed by 55 people, and posed questions varying in simplicity. The first question – Do you believe in the paranormal? Is purposefully provocative and straight forward. It is immediately known that biases would occur when touching on a mentally intimate subject, so the survey was set out to portray this bias as this method would support the subject of the research.

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60% of respondents claim to believe in the paranormal in question 1, with “I’m not sure” at 22% and 18% claiming they do not believe in the paranormal. Although this 60% is a majority, the 22% that claim they are undecided may already have the capability to believe in haunted houses, which seems to be a universal fact much more than the actual belief in the paranormal.

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This is reflected in the responses to the question “Do you have a ghost story/paranormal experience of your own?” Where the expected “No, and I don’t believe in the paranormal” stands at 21% of respondents, which is a 2% rise in negative response since the earlier, simple question of “Do you believe in the paranormal?” Could they have become more sure of themselves through only a few seconds of philosophical thought?

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It could also be suggested that those who took the survey became biased by the time they had answered the first question. When approached with an idea, it can become easy to empathise with others and recall stories told by your peers. This is particular in the case of paranormal beliefs, where it is common to be exposed to ‘real life’ adaptations and recollections of the paranormal. Holt and Lewis describe a study that addresses this problem (Holt 2012);

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“Indeed, recent experimental research shows that reported belief in extrasensory perception (ESP) may go against scientific opinion if participants are told that the belief is popular among the public”

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Further statistics from the survey can be seen in the appendix.