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Reichenbach phenomenon

an energy field allegedly emanating from crystals, magnets, and living things (both plants and animals). Adherents claim that it can be made visible by Kirlian photography but is otherwise discernible only by certain “sensitive” individuals. The phenomenon was first described by the Austrian chemist and metallurgist Baron Karl von Reichenbach (1788–1869), who held it to be a manifestation of an all-pervading physical force that he named Od or Odyle after the Norse god Odin. Reichenbach considered this force to be distinct from electricity and magnetism but similar to the animal magnetism of Franz Anton Mesmer. These ideas later influenced the Austrian psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich (1897–1957) and his theory of orgone energy. The Reichenbach phenomenon is now mainly cited by advocates of crystal healing. See also aura; effluvium.

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Psychology term of the day

January 13th 2025

reference memory

reference memory

in animal cognition, the representation of an association between objects, spatial locations, or other stimuli that remains consistent across several trials of an experimental session and is used to guide behavior. Matching to sample and various other tasks involving simultaneous or successive discrimination are commonly used to assess reference memory in nonhuman animals. For example, a pigeon presented with both a green and a red disk is rewarded with a food pellet for pecking the green one. If the green disk remains the correct choice across all trials in which the two objects are presented, the pigeon relies on reference memory to retain this information and choose the correct disk. Compare working memory. [initially described in 1978 by German-born U.S. psychologist Werner Konstantin Honig (1932–2001) and subsequently elaborated by U.S. physiological psychologist David Stuart Olton (1943–1994) and various colleagues]