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Alan Gauld (born 1932) is a British parapsychologist, psychologist and spiritualist writer best known for his research on the history of hypnotism and mediumship.
Gauld has generally been skeptical of physical mediumship. He has claimed that ectoplasm materializations seem to "smack very strongly of fraud and conjuring", such as made from cheesecloth or net curtain. He states however that he believes there is genuine evidence for Psychokinesis during séances including the phenomena produced with the medium Daniel Dunglas Home.Iverson, Jeffrey. (1992). In Search of the Dead. HarperCollins. p. 140. This is in opposition to other researchers who have declared that Home was fraudulent.See for example Booth, John. (1986). Psychic Paradoxes. Prometheus Books. p. 168. . Christopher, Milbourne. (1970). ESP, Seers & Psychics. Thomas Y. Crowell Co. pp. 174–87. . Ronald Pearsall. (1972). The Table-Rappers. Book Club Associates. pp. 95–96. . Wiley, Barry H. (2012). The Thought Reader Craze: Victorian Science at the Enchanted Boundary. McFarland. p. 36.
He has criticized the Scole experiment, a series of séances that members of the Society for Psychical Research investigated. During one of the séances there was "spontaneous appearance of images on film", though Gauld discovered that the locked box was "easily opened in the dark, which allowed for easy substitution of film rolls."
In 2022, Gauld authored The Heyday of Mental Mediumship, published by the spiritualist company White Crow Books which revealed he has spiritualist beliefs. "The Heyday of Mental Mediumship: 1880s – 1930s: Investigators, Mediums and Communicators". whitecrowbooks.com. Retrieved 31 August 2022.
Psychologist C. E. M. Hansel has criticized The Founders of Psychical Research for ignoring certain historical sources. Hansel noted that when discussing spiritualist mediums such as the Fox sisters or Eusapia Palladino, Gauld failed to "report important observations that suggest physical rather than psychical explanations."Hansel, C. E. M. (1968). Psychical History. Nature 219: 986–87.
He has drawn criticism from historian Ruth Brandon for disputing the confession of the Fox sisters.Ruth Brandon. (1983). The Spiritualists: The Passion for the Occult in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. Weidenfeld and Nicolson. pp. 230–31.
Gauld's book A History Of Hypnotism (1992) documents the history of hypnosis. It was positively reviewed by medical historian Roger Cooter in the The BMJ who recommended it as a "useful reference tool."Cooter, Roger. A History Of Hypnotism by Alan Gauld. British Medical Journal. Vol. 306, No. 6886 (May 1, 1993), pp. 1215–16. The book was also positively reviewed by philosopher Peter G. Sobol who wrote that "with its broad coverage and attention to detail, this is an indispensable book for any future work on the history of hypnosis."Sobol, Peter G. A History of Hypnotism by Alan Gauld. The Quarterly Review of Biology. Vol. 69, No. 3 (Sep., 1994), pp. 426–27. Psychologist Geoffrey Blowers also praised the book commenting that "he steers a clear path through the large, diverse literature and avoids a partisan stance on the findings to present a lively and informative account of this baffling phenomenon."Blowers, Geoffrey. A History of Hypnotism by Alan Gauld. The British Journal for the History of Science. Vol. 27, No. 2 (Jun., 1994), pp. 234–35. Psychiatrist Melvin A. Gravitz described the book as a "significant contribution to the field, which will stand as a hallmark of scholarship for many years."Gravitz, Melvin A. A History of Hypnotism by Alan Gauld. American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, 1993. Volume 36: 63–66.
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