Baker, Robert Allen, Jr. 1921–2005

OBITUARY NOTICE—See index for CA sketch: Born June 27, 1921, in Blackford, KY; died of congestive heart failure, August 8, 2005, in Lexington, KY. Psychologist, educator, and author. Baker was well known for his work in debunking paranormal and other strange occurrences, which he explained as phenomena with psychological origins. His skepticism for everything from religious zealotry to ghosts began when he was growing up in Kentucky. Although his parents took him to church, his father once told him that religious fervor could go too far on occasion. His interest in eerie occurrences as a young man led him to investigate spooky sounds emanating from a local cave, where he discovered that the noise originated from wind blowing through a cracked rock. With the onset of World War II, Baker enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Forces and became a cryptographer; at the same time, his fascination with psychology grew, and he read avidly on the subject. With the war over, he studied psychology at the University of Kentucky, earning a B.S. in 1948, followed by an M.S. in 1949. He then went to Stanford University to complete a doctorate in 1952. His first job was on the staff of the Lincoln Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which was involved in military research. His involvement in military work continued at Fort Knox, where he was a scientist at the Human Resources Research Office in the mid-1950s; he became a senior staff scientist from 1956 to 1960 and was group leader throughout the 1960s. It was here that he became more seriously involved in studying claims of ghostly haunting. Baker soon discovered that such mysterious incidents usually stemmed from psychological issues suffered by witnesses. In one case, for example, a woman who claimed to be haunted by a three-year-old girl was suffering from grief over not being able to bear children. Baker suggested she adopt, and the ghost quickly disappeared. When budget cuts led to trimmed staff at Fort Knox, Baker was hired at the University of Kentucky as a professor and chair of the psychology department. Remaining at the university until his 1988 retirement, Baker continued his research into the psychological origins of everything from ghosts to UFO abductions, repeatedly showing how all these paranormal and alien events could be traced to the mental traumas suffered by those who claimed to see such things. Baker also debunked the validity of such practices as hypnosis, which he said was all a matter of relaxation and suggestion techniques that proved nothing, and he criticized the overuse of medication for mental patients. Baker wrote and edited number of books, including such edited works as They Call It Hypnosis (1990), Hidden Memories: Voices and Visions from Within (1992; 2nd edition, 1996), Missing Pieces (1992), Mind Games (1996), and Child Sexual Abuse and False Memory Syndrome (1998). An active member of several psychology associations (he served as president of the Kentucky Psychological Association), Baker was also the author of Psychology in the Wry (1963) and Psychology for Man (1981).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Seattle Times, August 14, 2005, p. A23.

Times (London, England), September 15, 2005, p. 67.

Washington Post, August 12, 2005, p. B5.