Gauquelin, Françoise Schneider (1929-)

Swiss astrologer and statistician, born in French-speaking Switzerland. She attended the University of Paris, where she received a degree in statistics. In Paris she met and married Michel Gauquelin. While still in school, the two began to collect birth dates of large groups of people to determine if there was any relationship between the positions of the planets in the solar system and such factors as a person's choice of profession.

In their search for correlations they concentrated on outstanding professionals—sports champions, army officers, scientists, and so on. One of the first patterns they found was the presence of the planet Mars at either the horizon or the mid-heaven (two significant positions in the birth chart) at the time of birth. The frequency of these occurrences far exceeded any normal distribution due to chance alone and gave rise to the name "Mars effect" denoting a significant correlation between the position of the planets and professional achievement. Writers, for example, had a significantly positioned Moon, and scientists a significantly placed Saturn.

The Gauquelins' findings began to appear in publications in the 1960s. Michel published an initial book in 1967, The Cosmic Clocks, and then through the 1970s more than 25 volumes of statistical data were published by the couple from the Laboratoire d'Etude des Relations entre Rythmes Cosmiques et Psychophysiologiques, which they had founded in Paris. Their collaboration, however, as well as their marriage, came to an end in the 1980s.

Since that time Françoise has continued to write and publish (Michel died in 1991). For a number of years she edited Astro-Psychological Problems (1982-88). Her 1982 Psychology of the Planets emphasizes the agreement of her and Michel's statistical results and traditional astrology, the differences having been emphasized in several of Michel's writings.

Sources:

Lewis, James L. The Astrology Encyclopedia. Detroit: Gale Research, 1994.

Series A: Professional Notabilities. 6 vols. Paris: Laboratoire d'Etude des Relations entre Rythmes Cosmiques et Psychophysiologiques, 1970-71.

Series B: Heredity Experiments. 6 vols. Paris: Laboratoire d'Etude des Relations entre Rythmes Cosmiques et Psychophysiologiques, 1970-71.

Series C: Psychological Monographs. 5 vols. Paris: Laboratoire d'Etude des Relations entre Rythmes Cosmiques et Psychophysiologiques, 1972-77.

Series D: Scientific Documents. 10 vols. Paris: Laboratoire d'Etude des Relations entre Rythmes Cosmiques et Psychophysiologiques, 1976-82.