A test of the overall validity of astrological statements in the handbook by Sakoian and Acker

by Kyösti Tarvainen

Correlation, Vol. 28, August 2012, pp 5-24

Abstract

The validity of 316 statements in The Astrologer’s Handbook by Sakoian and Acker was tested. These descriptions concern eleven professions or groups for which the Gauquelins’ data was available (over 18,000 persons). Control groups were generated by shuffling all elements of the birth data except for dates for which a random perturbation of at most 30 days was drawn. The validity of this method of forming control groups was ascertained by simulations. It turned out that 180 statements in the handbook were correct and 136 not correct in the Gauquelins’ data (hit rate 57% versus 50% by chance). This is a statistically significant result in favor of overall validity of the statements in the handbook (p-value 0.001). The p-value was determined by (Monte Carlo) simulations. As a by-product it was noticed that Neptune was prominent in the charts of alcoholics.