PercephralandMotor Skills, 1992, 7 5 , 1135-1153. O Perceptual and Motor Skills 1992

TRANSPERSONAL EXPERIENCES I N CHILDHOOD: AN EXPLORATORY EMPIRICAL STUDY O F SELECTED ADULT GROUPS l s 2 HARRY T. HUNT

ARLENE GERVAIS

Brock University

Carleron University

SHERYL SHEARING-JOHNS Ontario lnstitute for Studies in Education

AND

FRED TRAVIS Maharishi International University

Summary.-A questionnaire was developed to assess adult recall for a range of transpersonal experiences throughout childhood and adolescence (mystical experience, out-of-body experience, lucid dreams, archetypal dreams, ESP), as well as nightmares and night terrors as indicators of more conflicted, negative states. In two exploratory studies this questionnaire was administered to subjects with h g h estimated levels of early transpersonal experiences and practising meditators, with respective undergraduate controls. A cognitive skills/precocity model of early transpersonal experience was contrasted with a vulnerability of self model by comparisons of these groups on questionnaire categories, imaginative absorption, neuroticism, and visual-spatial s u s , with some support found for both models depending on experience type, age of estimated recall, and adult meditative practice.

The occurrence of transpersonal experience in childhood has been well documented in a diverse anecdotal literature. Early mystical experience, out-of-body experience, lucid dreams, archetypal dreams, and extrasensory capacities have been recalled by adults as occurring at ages four and five, with some reports around two years of age, and a few even at eight or nine months (Armstrong, 1984; Hoffman, 1990; Laski, 1961; Kluger, 1975). While such claims are hard to evaluate and pose special problems for theories of these states, they are widely asserted and supported to some extent by informal conversations between teachers and second and rhird grade children (Kate Ruzycki-Hunt, personal communication). To our knowledge this is the first empirical study, albeit exploratory, of adults' recall of the full variety of transpersonal states in childhood. The early occurrence of such experiences is the least problematic for the classical models of Freud and Jung but poses a special challenge for more current cognitive-developmental approaches to these experiences as indicative

'A version of this paper was presented at the Lucidity Association conference, University of Virginia, June, 1991. The authors thank Chris Jones of Maharishi International Universit and Kathy.Belicki of Brock University for editorial advice. Sincere thanks go to the faculty anistaff of Maharishi International University for hosting the visit and arranging the interviews of S. Shearing-Johns at the MIU campus in Fairfield, Iowa. Reprint requests should be addressed to H. T. Hunt, Department of Psychology, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada L2S 3A1.

1136

H. T. HUNT, ETAL.

of self-actualization in mature adulthood (Wilber, 1984; Alexander, Davies, Dixon, Dillbeck, Druker, Oetzel, Muehlman, & Orme-Johnson, 1990; Hunt, 1984, 1985, 1987b). For traditional psychoanalysis transpersonal experiences are regressions to the "oceanic feeling" of primary narcissism (Freud, 1930). Accordingly, their childhood occurrence would be an expectable indication of early deficit and/or trauma and probably inseparable from nightmares and night terrors as still more direct reflections of the latter. Interestingly, early transpersonal/ archetypal experience is equally expectable for Jungians, as for romantic and some spiritual traditions (Fordham, 1976; Almaas, 1986). The young child still possesses a primal self or soul not yet split or differentiated, and such experiences would be the direct expression of its wholeness. Armstrong (1984) has even tried to reconcile the spiritually advanced nature of these states by suggesting that their early childhood occurrence is a rare indication of the reincarnation of a person who was especially developed spiritually in a previous life. It seems likely that both the traditional psychoanalytic and romantic perspectives, at least on this issue, risk being more judgmental, ideological positions than researchable theories. The situation is more complex and challenging for those seeking some cognitive-developmental account of transpersonal experience as potentially based on a specific symbolic capacity and/or directly showing the "deep structures" of all intelligence. I n particular, the first author (Hunt, 1785, 1989a, 1989b) has tried to show how out-of-body experience and lucid dreams rest on the abstract capacity for "taking the role of the other" for its own sake that is also involved in meditation, and how the "white light" experience of mysticism involves a cross-modal translation or synesthetic capacity that Geschwind (1965) has argued is at the root of all symbolic cognition. Since the ability to match cross-modally and translate patterns from different sensory modalities develops very slowly through childhood, the early occurrence of experiences of such pure or abstract "felt meaning" becomes problematic. Also fitting a cognitive-developmental model are several studies showing correlations of high frequencies of adult transpersonal experiences with superior performance on abstract nonverbal cognitive abilities-especially the visual-spatial skills measured by block designs, embedded figures, and imaginal rotation tests (Snyder & Gackenbach, 1988; Irwin, 1985; Spadafora & Hunt, 1990). Such findings make sense either in the view of Alexander, et al. (1990) and Wilber (1984) of transpersonal experience as a post-formal intelligence of later adulthood-centered around the abstract unfolding of feelings, intuition, and metaphor, or in Gardner's (1983) model of multiple frames of intelligence-of which language would be but one. Each frame having its own line of development, transpersonal experience might index the full development of a frame based on imagistic intelligence. O n either of these the-

TRANSPERSONAL EXPERIENCES IN CHILDHOOD

1137

oretical accounts' transpersonal experiences are abstract and so should not be present in early childhood unless they are interpreted as a developmental "precocity"-and such potential precocity is indeed one of Gardner's suggested criteria for identifying an autonomous frame (as in musical or mathematical precocity). If subjects with later recall of childhood transpersonal experience were, in Gackenbach's (1988) term, "consciousness savants," we would expect that to be reflected in high nonverbal intelligence in adulthood. A related debate, feeding into the present study, concerns the relation of these experiences to psychic health or pathology and can be dealt with more briefly. While Maslow (1971) related "peak experience" to the "positive mental health" of self-actuahzation, Grof (1988) has made the successful negotiation of death-rebirth "spiritual emergencies," reminiscent of panic states in acute schizophrenia, central to full transpersonal development. Similarly, so c d e d "metapathologies" of adult spiritual development (grandiosity and withdrawal) overlap with borderline and narcissistic disorders (Wilber, 1984; Engler, 1984), and the object relations and self-psychology perspectives within current psychoanalysis have located these difficulties in deficits in the holding environment of the young child and infant. Indeed, Lynn and Rhue (1988) describe a dimension of "fantasy proneness" in childhood which, in its positive form, develops into adult imaginative involvement and hypnotizability, but crossed by trauma would appear as later dissociations, multiple personality, and narcissistic or self deficit. ~ c c o r d i n ~ we l ~ , can ask whether childhood transpersonal experiences are per se indicative of narcissistic vulnerability-as ways of containment and defense against trauma-or whether they can unfold independently of stress and be associated with abstract cognitive skills. I n this regard, we will look at the relation between the occurrence of mystical experience, out-of-body experience, lucid dreams, and archetypal dreams in childhood and adolescence and the occurrence of night terrors and nightmares, as potential indicators of vulnerability and trauma. Are early experiences necessarily mixed with negative forms or is there evidence of a nonconflictual, positive line of development?

METHOD A questionnaire was developed based on six questions concerning the experience of mystical awareness, out-of-body experience, lucid dreams, archetypal-mythological dreams, extrasensory and visionary experiences, nightmares, and night terrors (Appendix, pp. 1152-1153, to be consulted for working definitions of these categories). Subjects were asked to estimate the 'For a fuller description of these alternatives, not directly relevant to the present data, see Hunt (in press).

1138

H. T. HUNT, E T A L

number of each experience per year since infancy. Here the scores are divided into per year averages from birth to ten years of age, eleven to sixteen, and seventeen and over. The questionnaire was administered to selected groups in two studies, with the somewhat simplified version used in the second study (with item labels omitted as potentially suggestive) found in the Appendix.' In addition to the various cognitive and personality measures mentioned in each study, the subjects with the most striking early experiences were interviewed and asked to describe their earliest rated experiences in each category, possible environmental determinants, and how their experiences changed with development. The present report w d concentrate, however, on our quantitative findings, noting only that the interviews provided some validation for the subjects reporting high estimates of experiences. Our first study, done with Arlene Gervais, was based on city and university newspaper advertisements and recruitment from the introductory psychology course of Brock University, looking for subjects claiming high frequencies of childhood transpersonal experiences. Our final selection of eight unquestionably high-response subjects was based on estimated frequencies of childhood mystical, out-of-body, lucid, and archetypal experience (especially the first two) but never on nightmare or night terror estimates, which were ignored as criteria for group selection for all three groups. The second group of 12 subjects, selected from the same newspaper ads and introductory psychology class, turned out on inspection to have minimal childhood experiences but high estimates of transpersonal categories beginning in adolescence. The small size of both of these groups may attest to the relative infrequency of high transpersonal experiences in childhood and early adolescence. (We evaluated approximately 60 potential volunteers to find these 20 subjects.) The final group of 22 subjects were "controls," selected from a separate approach to the introductory class and showing no or minimal childhood, adolescent, or adult transpersonal experiences. There were a total of 42 subjects (36 women, 6 men), almost all university students or graduates, who estimated levels of experience per year (thence divided into per year estimates for childhood, adolescence, and adulthood) and who were also 'Definite limitations in the present questionnaire have led us away from considering our data as offering reliable escirnates of actual occurrence of early experiences or as offering meaningful comparisons between our two studies and to concentrate instead on intercorrelations for each of the three age groups considered separately for each study. Apart from the limitation imposed by the simplification of che questionnaire in the second study, it should be noted that the earliest estimates are necessarily of experiences so striking as to be retained for years, while estimates for ages seventeen and over are more likely to include less intrinsically memorable states. For instance, the estimated frequenm of n~ghtmaresis quite low compared to concurrent normative data (Belicki & Belicki, 1986). \i~ggcstingagain that our data should be analyzed on1 in terms of relative differences wichin c ~ c hsrudy and their relation in turn to measures orcognitive style. Finally, the present format of yearly escirnates through age sixteen and general estimates afterwards can be confusing and re uires careful explanation. A less ambiguous version of this questionnaire is being developed wit1 Jayne Gackenbach.

TRANSPERSONAL EXPERIENCES IN CHILDHOOD

1139

administered the Hood scale of mystical experience (1975), Eysenck's Neuroticism scale (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1968), a self-rating measure of imaginative involvement in reading, film, and nature (Hilgard, 1970; Hunt & Popham, 1987), Stein's (1975) Physiognomic Cue Test (assessing metaphorical proclivity), the Thurstone Embedded Figures Test (1944), and the WAIS Block Designs (Wechsler, 1975). Our second study, done with Sheryl Shearing-Johns and Fred Travis, compared a group likely to have high frequencies of early childhood experiences, 72 subjects from the introductory psychology class at Maharishi International University who were all experienced meditators (34 men, 38 women) with 78 control subjects from the introductory psychology course at Brock University (38 men, 41 women). These latter volunteered for a study of imagination and dreaming, so they might be roughly comparable to the MIU sample in basic interest in an experiential orientation. I n addition to the transpersonal experience questionnaire scored for the three age ranges as above, these subjects were measured on the Cattell Culture Fair Test (Cattell & Cattell, 1980) for spatial intelligence, Hilgard's imaginative involvement rating scale, and earliest age of occurrence for transpersonal experience. I n our results the two studies are presented together for each type of analysis because the more normative basis of the comparison of the MIU vs Brock subjects helps give a context for the smaller first study. However, i t must be stressed that the means of the two studies cannot be meaningfully compared, owing not only to simplification of the questionnaire for the second study, but to the very different selection procedures for the first and second Brock University samples. Within each sample sex differences and age were almost uniformly nonsignificant and so were not included. Men and women were equally divided in the MIU and second Brock groups, while the sample for the first Brock/ . St. Catharines study was predominantly women. The MIU sample was significantly older than its Brock controls. Because the questionnaire data were skewed in distribution, with extreme outliers in the high-response groups in Study I and the MIU group in Study 11, ranking statistics were used for all analyses (Siegel, 1956).

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Group Dijferences Study L-Table

1 presents the per year means (and sometimes medians where outliers create impressions contradicting statistical findings) for the three groups in the first Brock sample. Over-all significance is based on the Kruskal-Wallis analysis of variance, with Mann-Whitney U tests applied between groups. The first significant differences support our selection procedures in that there were generally significant separations between the criterial childhood

TRANSPERSONAL EXPERIENCESm SELECTEDGROWS Experiences Gmup 1 Control (No Experience) (n = 22) SD M Mystical A B C Out-of-body A B C Archetypal Dream A R C Lucid Dream A B C ESP A B C Nightmare A B C

Brock University I (Per Year Means and Standard Deviations) Group 2 Group 3 Starting in Adolescence Starting in Childhood (n = 12) (n = 8) M SD M SD

Kruskal-Wallis Analysis of Variance P Group Comparison

0.0 1 .9

0.0 .1 2.7

1 1.0 16.3

.2 1.2 47.5

.9 2.6 32.5

1.3 3.6 85.2

.0004 .0001 ,006

3>2>1 3,2 > 1 3,2 > 1

0.0 0.0 1.4

0.0

0.0 .2 3.7

1

Mdn

10.1 .5 2.5

28.3

Mdn

,009 .03 .004

3>2,1 3,2>1 3,2>1 3,2>1 3,2 > 1 2>1

5.6

9.5

Mdn 3.7 9.3

0.0 0.0 .3

Mdn Mdn

1.2 .5 1.0

Mdn Mdn

4.3 .2 2.5

Mdn Mdn

,0004 .007 .03

1.0 .5 1.2

4.4 1.5 2.8

2.8 1.2 3.7

8.6 2.3 5.6

7.4 7.0 5.8

9.7 10.1 5.5

,002 ,003 .01

3>2,1 3>2>1 3,2 > 1

0.0 .2 0.0

.1 .5

.7 2.2 1.0

.8 4.3

1.5 1.0 1.5

3.4 1.5

.02 .03 .005

3,2 > 1 2>1 2 >1

.03 ,008

3,2 > 1 2 >1

1.0 .8 4.4

.1

Mdn Mdn 1.1 11.0

2.2 4.1 11.9

2.0

Mdn Mdn 6.0 29 2

(continued on next page)

5.0 2.3 3.2

Mdn Mdn 3.4 2.7

TABLE 1 (CONT'D) TRANSPERSONAL EXPERIENCES IN SELECTED GROUPS

-

rA

Experiences Group 1 Control (No Experience) (n = 22) Night Terror A B C Hood Questionnaire Imaginative Involvement Neuroticism Physiognomic Cue Test Embedded Figures Block Designs

M

SD

.01 .4 .9 99.0 12.4 16.0 97.0 1.3 31.0

1

1.0 2.2 22.7 2.9 4.2 19.4 .7 7.9

Brock University I (Per Year Means and Standard Deviations) Gmu~ 2 G r o u ~3 Starting in tidolescence Starting in childhood (n = 12) (n = 8) M SD M SD .4 1.4 9.1 119.0 11.7 17.0 103.0 1.5 35.0

.5 2.7 21.6 19.6 4.3 4.4 17.0 1.0 9.5

1.2 .8 1.2 104.0 12.1 11.0 84.0 1.6 37.0

2.6 1.2 1.7 45.9 5.2 5.1 46.1

Kruskal-Wallis Analysis of Variance P Group Comparison ,005

3,2> 1

.05

2>1

.03

1,2>3

? Z

m

8 m

sz

n m

rA

2

z

1.1

15.6

m w

5

.06

3>1

Note.-A = p e r year estimates 0-10; B = p e r year estimates 11-16; and C = per year estimates 17 and over. Mdn indicates the values in that row are not means but medians owing to misleading outlier effects.

E;

3:

0 0

u

1142

H. T. HUNT, ETAL

experiences for the eight subjects with early childhood initiation vs the adolescent initiated group vs the controls. There are also few significant differences between the two special groups for adolescent and adult levels, while both groups differed significantly from the controls. The first substantive findings among the types of experiences are the high estimated frequencies of childhood nightmare and night terror experiences in both special groups compared to the controls. Apparently we could not find subjects with early transpersonal experience who also did not give many early indications of involuntary, traumatic experiences in sleep (although Tables 3 and 4 below will show considerable individual variability in direct association between negative and positive experiences). The significant difference between the adolescent initiation group (only) and the controls on the Hood questionnaire of over-all mystical reports suggests that frequent childhood transpersonal reports do not necessarily lead to the most frequent reports from adolescence and adulthood. Most strikingly in terms of our initial questions about indications of pathology and/or visual-spatial skills in early initiators, neuroticism was significantly lower in our special eight subjects than in the controls and adolescent initiators, with the adolescent group actually being highest. This implies that recall of early transpersonal experience may actually be associated with emotional balance in adulthood, contrary to classical psychiatric assumptions. O n the WAIS Block Designs, moreover, the early experiencers ~ e r f o r m e dsignificantly better than the control group ( p < 0 . 0 5 , Mann-Whitney U test, p < 0.06 over-all). This implies that early transpersonal experience either requires or creates high visual-spatial skills, ~ e r h a p sto contain and organize these powerful imagistic states. This finding is broadly consistent with our "precocity" model. Study II.-Table 2 presents means, standard deviations, and Mann-Whitney U tests comparing the MIU meditators and Brock controls. Childhood mystical, out-of-body, lucid dream, and ESP estimates were all significantly greater for the MIU sample. Interestingly, there were no significant differences in childhood nightmares and night terrors so that, with the MIU meditators, the elevation in childhood transpersonal experiences was not at the price of negative panic experiences. Indeed, it was the Brock group who showed significant elevations in adolescent night terrors and near significance for adolescent nightmares. Not surprisingly, in terms of studies reviewed by Alexander, et al. (1990) showing frequent spontaneous transpersonal experiences in long-term meditators, the MIU subjects showed significant elevations in adult mystical, archetypal, and ESP estimates. The decline in out-ofbody experience in the MIU sample relative to that of the Brock controls may reflect the discouragement of such experience in Transcendental Meditation. O n the other hand, its significant elevation in childhood, and frequen-

1143

TRANSPERSONAL EXPERIENCES I N C H I L D H O O D TABLE 2

TRANSPERSONU EXPERIENCES M MIU MEDITATORS A N D BROCKCONTROLS: MEANSAND STANDARD DEVIATIONS PERYEAR Experiences Mystical

MIU (N = 72) M SD A

.7 2.6 18.2 .9 1.5 .7 2.1 4.8 1.3 3.3 13.1

3.8 8.6 77.9 4.8 9.0 1.6 2.5 9.1 24.1 4.2 10.0 73.4

.5

.9

.7 1.2 4.6 11.0

1.0

5.5

0.0

2.4 45.4 2.0 2.0 9.0 .4 .7 .7 11.9 26.7

8.6 285.7 5.9 Mdn 59.1 1.3 2.3 2.5 3.4 4.5

2.4 6.3 15.0 40.4 1 .8 4.1 7.0 Mdn 22.5 1.4 6.4 2.3 2.9 3.7

B Out-of-body

C A

B C Archetypal Dream

A B

.6

c

Lucid Dream

A

B

C ESP

A B C A B C

Brock I1 (N = 78) M SD .2 1.2 1.2 0.0 .1 .2 .4

P'

1.9 5.5 2.7 0.0 .4 .8

2.9

.2 1.1 Nightmare 2.2 4.0 4.0 Night Terror A .3 B 1.5 C .6 Imaginative Involvement 11.5 Cattell 25.9 Note.-A =per year estimates, 0-10 years; B =per year estimates, 11-16 years; C = p e r year estimates, 17 and over. '

'Mann-Whitney U Test, 1-tail analysis

cies of chddhood nightmares and night terrors comparable to those for Brock subjects, suggest that the MIU meditators were not merely following T M teachings in their responses or giving a "socially desirable" impression of their earlier experiences.

Correlations Between Transpersonal Experiences and Cognitive Style Variables Sttrdy I.-Combining all 42 subjects from the first study for Spearman correlations of experiences with individual difference variables (Table 3), it is interesting that the visual-spatial skills of Block Designs and embedded figures correlate best with estimates of out-of-body and mystical experiences at most ages. There is also some suggestion of a decrement in embedded figures, blocks, and imaginative involvement with frequent childhood night terrors. Marginally significant correlations are in parentheses. This fits well with the findings of Spadafora and Hunt (1990) that negative forms of dream experience (nightmares) show decrements on the same visual-spatial skills on which lucid and archetypal dreamers can show superiority. Here,

TABLE 3 TRANSPERSONAL EXPERIENCE A N D COGNITIVE STYLE:STUDY1, SPEARMAN CORRELATIONS* (N = 42) Measure A

Mystical B C

.36

Hood Neuroticism Physiognomic Cue Embedded Figures Block Designs Imaginative Involvement

Out-of-body A B C

.28

Archetypal A B C

Lucid A

.51 .50

B

C

.35

A

ESP B

.39

.37 .39

C

Nightmare A B C

Night Terror A B C

.31 .25

.27 .31 .25

(-.23)

.31 .49 .39 .29 .42 .43

-.28 (-.21) .25

.32 .26

.26

-.36

Note.-A = p e r year estimates, 0-10; B =per year estimates, 11-16; C =per year estimates, 17 + . *For N = 42, r = .25 at pC0.05, I-tail; r = .35 at p

Transpersonal experiences in childhood: an exploratory empirical study of selected adult groups.

A questionnaire was developed to assess adult recall for a range of transpersonal experiences throughout childhood and adolescence (mystical experienc...
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