Ghost hunters often have the best intentions when it comes to the methods they use to investigate alleged hauntings. However, their attempts to introduce a scientific methodology into proceedings usually fail to reach the mark. This outcome, I believe, is mainly because the ghost-hunting subculture is rife with issues of confirmation bias. In simpler terms, ghost hunters are too often led by their desire to find evidence that ghosts exist, rather than taking a more open-minded approach. They may not be sure how to introduce scientific controls or rigour into their ghost-hunting activities, and may even be unaware of the need for such controls. As a result, ghost hunters reinvent the wheel in an attempt to be scientific, only to find it’s a wheel that never worked in the first place, and now they’ve made it even worse.
The latest trend sweeping through ghost-hunting groups is an excellent example of this issue. A modern twist on traditional spirit communication, the Estes Method (invented by American ghost tour operators), offers a new take on the Spirit Box, which ghost hunters have used to attempt communication with ghosts for decades. The Spirit Box rapidly sweeps through radio frequencies, creating a stream of white noise and audio snippets from different broadcast sources. Advocates claim that spirits can manipulate these audio fragments to form words or sentences to communicate with the living. The method is simple; the ghost hunter asks a question, and the ghost uses the audio from the Spirit Box to answer them.
In reality, the messages of ghostly origin result from listener bias, suggestion, and audio illusions. Sentences from the broadcasts are often incomplete, meaning that the phonemes (human speech sounds) can be misheard and, more importantly, misinterpreted as relevant to whatever ghost a ghost hunter is trying to communicate with. Prior knowledge of an alleged haunting can influence ghost hunters to interpret audio as direct answers to questions asked when this is unlikely to be the case. Choppy audio with gaps in words and sentences can cause one word to merge into another, resulting in something which sounds familiar, or the ghost hunter fills in the gaps (often without even realising they’re doing so).
The Estes Method builds on this spirit communication method and tries to scientifically improve it by adding noise-isolating headphones and blindfolds to ensure the person listening to the audio (referred to as the “Receiver”) can’t hear the questions being asked or read the lips of the person asking them. The Receiver listens for messages from ghosts through the Spirit Box in response to questions asked by the “Operator,” another group member. By channelling the audio through headphones so only one person hears it, the Estes Method tries to overcome the influence that listener bias has on Spirit Box sessions, as the Receiver does not hear the questions asked.
However, these controls are less effective than ghost hunters intend. The audio through the headphones is still open to the Receiver’s interpretation, influenced by their knowledge of the very ghost stories that tempted the ghost hunters to visit a haunting location in the first place. Additionally, the Operator (the person asking questions) also knows about the haunting, influencing their questions and their interpretation of the answers given. Though Operators are not supposed to tailor questions based on received answers, they inevitably do because of the biased nature of their search for evidence of ghosts.
When examined in the broader context, it’s easy to see that the Estes Method falls foul of the same unscientific behaviours typical of ghost hunters. For example, there are instances of the Estes Method used in ghost-hunting television shows or online videos where a question gets asked, and an “answer” is given that makes no sense, or the Receiver says something not in response to a question. The ghost hunters will likely ignore these out-of-context statements, with only the positive responses shared as evidence. This practice of selectively presenting data that supports your hypothesis while ignoring data that contradicts it is an unethical practice known as cherry-picking, which results in biased and often misleading research outcomes. It is also a habit that has plagued ghost hunters for as long as they’ve been around.
The biggest flaw of the Estes Method is the lack of scientific evidence supporting the claim that spirits can communicate by manipulating radio frequencies. As commendable as it is to see ghost hunters trying to add some form of control to the controversial Spirit Box methodology, it is essential to acknowledge that the Spirit Box itself is a redevelopment of an older ghost-hunting practice known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP) where ghost hunters use audio recording devices in haunted locations, believing they may capture supposed ghostly voices or messages during the recording process.
Ghost hunters play back these recordings to identify strange sounds or voices. Often, recordings occur while the ghost hunter asks questions, pausing between questions to allow ghosts to respond. Electronic spirit communication methods such as EVP, the Spirit Box, and the new kid on the block—the Estes Method—heavily rely on subjective interpretation and are susceptible to psychological phenomena like pareidolia and confirmation bias, which undermine the credibility and reliability of these so-called scientific approaches to ghost hunting.
Research has consistently shown that paranormal beliefs are often inversely related to science literacy. That is, the higher the levels of paranormal belief a person reports, the lower their science literacy rates. Science literacy and critical thinking skills are mutually reinforcing, empowering people to question assumptions while analysing evidence objectively. No matter how hard ghost hunters try to become more scientific in their work, if their activities aim to find proof of ghosts, their attempts will often fall short of scientific rigour. Ultimately, this means that no amount of gimmicky techniques or reinventing traditional methods will change the quality and reliability of ghost-hunting conclusions unless ghost hunters develop a genuinely open-minded approach to their research.
