Anomalistic research, i.e. research in the border areas of science, does not differ from other research fields or academic disciplines in terms of scientific standards and methodology. Nevertheless, it is subject to specific conditions that make it what can be described as “high-risk research” – for two reasons: (1) It deals with phenomena whose ontological status is unclear and in some cases highly controversial. (2) This
uncertain ontological status can lead to the rejection – and even the general denial of the raison d’être – of this branch of research within the scientific community.
The special nature of the phenomena may require interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary and also multimethodological approaches, which makes a particular professional flexibility and openness desirable and a social science-informed perspective necessary, from which specific principles for the research of unusual experiences and phenomena follow. We refer to this approach as reflective anomalistics. The defining adjective “reflexive” denotes a research program that is based on
