This article is interesting, for two reasons. First it gives a brief history of the man considered the father of modern stage magic, Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin, and then it details some research by modern psychologists on the ‘informal’ research of modern stage magicians.
From the article:
“At a major conference last year in Las Vegas, in a scientific paper published last week and another due out this week, psychologists have argued that magicians, in their age-old quest for better ways to fool people, have been engaging in cutting-edge, if informal, research into how we see and comprehend the world around us.”
Full article at: How magicians control your mind