Models and Concepts of the Supernatural in Cases of Children’s Perception: The Experience of an Internet Survey

Abstract

The study is devoted to analyzing the reports of childhood experiences with the supernatural. The source base is formed from the results of Internet survey conducted by the author. The author carried out a typologization of the sample from the survey data and proposed an interpretation that correlates the survey responds both with traditional folklore imagery and the psychological reasons underlying the event described by the respondent. The author comes to the conclusion that a kind of hypertext in the picture of such cases represented by the respondents is formed, which includes both references to traditional folklore and borrowings from mass culture. At the same time, in a number of cases the author raises the question that a psychological interpretation of the above descriptions as cases of mixing sleep and reality or phantom memories is possible.