Experiment October 2009: Testing Numerology

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A) What this experiment was about

This online experiment was designed to test the ability of numerology to predict the salient personality traits of individuals. According to numerology, the “life path number” (derived from a person’s birth date), “represents who you are at birth and the native traits that you will carry with you through your life" (http://www.astrology-numerology.com/num-lifepath.html). The life path number is the sum of a person’s birth date, added up and reduced until a single digit is obtained (from 1-9). Each of the 9 life path numbers supposedly corresponds to a personality type. In order to test this claim Columinate conducted a small experiment amongst members of our Facebook group.


B) How we did it

Members of the Columinate Facebook group were invited to take part in this online experiment. In total 44 people completed the experiment. The experiment consisted of a brief demographic section followed by a section on belief in numerology and finally two questions to test numerology’s predictive abilities. These two questions were 1) the individuals birth date (from which we can determine the “life path” number); and 2) a question that determines the person’s own evaluation of their salient personality traits from a list of options. The nine options were taken from websites dedicated to life path numerology (see for example http://www.numerologylifepath.com/), and represent the possible numerology readings that a person could receive based on their life path number.

1- You are a natural born leader. Your nature is independent and defined by need for personal attainment.	6- You are a nurturer. You have a strong natural instinct toward domesticity which lends you the ability to cultivate a rock solid family and home life.
2- You are a peacemaker. You are a diplomatic person and have powerful skills of persuasion to settle conflicts and carve your path in the world.	7- You are a investigator. You are a thinker and an observer and have the ability to evaluate things fast and to the point. You are a great judge of character and a strict perfectionist.
3- You are a creative person with excellent communications skills. You have a very optimistic attitude and excel in areas such as writing, speaking or acting.	8- You are the ultimate organizer. You are ambitious and efficient and able to manage your environment well in any situation.
4- You are a builder. You are genius at planning, fixing, building and making things work. You tend to be viewed as practical, down to Earth and trustworthy.	9- You are a humanitarian. You are generous, compassionate and emotional. Reward for you comes in the form of selflessness for the common good and helping others rather than material gain.
5- You are a freedom seeker. You strive to make the world a better place. You are naturally adventurous and desire to be unrestrained in any way.

The major goal is to identify how the prediction of salient personality traits according to numerology (determined by the life path number) matches up to the person’s own evaluation of their personality. If the numerological predictions match up with the person’s own evaluation of their personality then it would be counted as a “hit”, if not it would be counted as a “miss”. If numerology is able to predict the personality of individuals at a level above chance then we would expect a large number of hits.


C) The Results

1. Who took part?
In total 44 people completed the experiment. The mean age of participants was 30.9 (standard deviation: 9.5), with the youngest respondent being 17 and the oldest 59. The majority of respondents (40) were from South Africa with 2 respondents from the USA, 1 from the Netherlands and 1 from Mozambique. There was an almost equal split between female (23) and male (21) participants.

2. Skeptics or Believers?
The figure below reveals the sample to consist of a roughly similar number of skeptics and believers in the alleged powers of numerology. There also seems to be a substantial proportion of people that prefer to remain neutral regarding the ability of numerology to accurately determine a person’s personality and/or fate.

Agreement with statements relating to belief in numerology



3. Does numerology work?
Numerology succeeded in predicting 8 out of the 44 individuals salient personality traits based solely on the life path number derived from the person’s birth date. That means that numerology failed to predict 82% of the sample’s personality correctly. It should also be kept in mind that a random guess would deliver 4.9 correct predictions (44 respondents divided by 9 options). That means numerology fairs almost no better than a random guess.

Numerology prediction success rate

Result	Frequency	Percent
Missed	36	82%
Hits	8	18%
TOTAL	44	100%

The short answer to the question of whether numerology works should thus be ‘no’. You would not trust a psychologist that only succeeded in correctly identifying one in every five people’s salient personality traits, so why give numerology that privilege?

4. I want to believe...?
If the evidence for numerology does not stand up to its claims why do people still believe in this form of alleged divination? One part of the explanation is the so-called Forer Effect (or validation fallacy). This refers to the observation that individuals will give high accuracy ratings to descriptions of their personality if they are told the “reading” is specifically tailored for them, but are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people. To test how the Forer effect applies to numerology, the end of the experiment provided a bogus “personalised personality reading” for each participant, which was claimed to be based on that individual's life path number. It was in fact the same identical statement provided to all participants. The statement was taken from the original 1948 work of Psychologist Bertram R. Forer (after whom the effect was named):

“You have a need for other people to like and admire you, and yet you tend to be critical of yourself. While you have some personality weaknesses you are generally able to compensate for them. You have considerable unused capacity that you have not turned to your advantage. Disciplined and self-controlled on the outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure on the inside. At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations. You also pride yourself as an independent thinker; and do not accept others' statements without satisfactory proof. But you have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others. At times you are extroverted, affable, and sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary, and reserved. Some of your aspirations tend to be rather unrealistic.”

Participants were asked how accurate this evaluation was for them personally on scale from 1 (very poor) to 5 (excellent). The mean rating was 4.0 (standard deviation of 0.89) with 70.5% claiming the reading was good (4 rating) or excellent (5 rating). The implication for numerology readings is clear – the more general and vague the descriptions the better.


D) How much fun was this experiment?

We are glad to report that the mean liking rating for this experiment was a 8.2 on a 10 point scale, proving that participating in research can be fun! A huge thanks to everyone that participated, watch out for more fun surveys on our Facebook group, which you can join here.

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