Why do we still hold séances when the practice is so often exposed as fraud?

Cultures · Published 29 September 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: Derived from the French word for session, a séance is a gathering intended to bridge the gap between the living and the dead. While often dismissed as mere stage magic or parlor trickery, the practice persists across religious and occult traditions, fueled by a complex history of belief and skepticism.

The séance gained immense popularity during the mid-nineteenth century, becoming a staple of the Spiritualist movement. Even figures like Mary Todd Lincoln hosted sessions in the White House to cope with grief. However, the practice has long been shadowed by accusations of deception. The 1887 Seybert Commission report famously undermined Spiritualism by exposing the showmanship and fraudulent methods employed by many prominent séance leaders, who used tools like spirit trumpets, slates, and cabinets to simulate paranormal phenomena.

Skeptics and magicians, including Harry Houdini and John Nevil Maskelyne, spent decades documenting how mediums used stage magic to manipulate audiences. Critics often point to the ideomotor effect—a subconscious mechanism where a user unknowingly moves a planchette—to explain the results of spirit board sessions. Furthermore, research in anomalistic psychology, such as the 2003 experiments by Wiseman et al., suggests that belief plays a critical role in perception; believers are significantly more likely to report physical manifestations, such as a levitating table, even when the objects remain stationary.

Despite these exposures, the séance remains a vital component of various religious services, including Spiritualist and Espiritismo churches, where the focus shifts toward spiritual values rather than theatrical displays. Some practitioners, such as the artist Paulina Peavy, have credited spirits with directing their creative work. While skeptics view the entire history of mediumship as inherently fraudulent, many believers have simply adapted by abandoning the use of specialized tools, maintaining their confidence in the practice as a genuine means of communicating with the spirit world.

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