• Spiritual and knightly orders - briefly Orders of the Middle Ages
• Catacombs and Necropolises and dusk vs dawn
• Quest Day of Destiny: Dark Elf's Fate
• What is self-flagellation Self-flagellation poe
• Find the rank of a matrix: methods and examples
• 9/11 survivors
• The worst floods in human history
• When a colleague is a sneak If a schemer wound up in a team or how to fight competently
• The best sniper The best sniper in the world
• What does the devil look like Who is Satan and her pictures

Text: Marina Levicheva

For the sake of discoveries or developments, scientists go to the most amazing experiments: for example, they try to determine the genre of a film by the composition of the air in a cinema, or they invent bacterial batteries. But there is little that compares in complexity to even the most seemingly unsophisticated psychological experiment. The behavior of the human psyche is difficult to predict, it is important to take into account the maximum risks, consider the consequences in the long term and, of course, strictly observe confidentiality.

Modern ethical postulates, which are guided by the authors of studies involving humans, began to form a long time ago - starting with the ten points of the Nuremberg Code, adopted in 1947 as a response to the monstrous medical experiments of Josef Mengele in concentration camps. Then came the Declaration of Helsinki, the Belmont Report, the 1993 Council of International Organizations for Medical Sciences (CIOMS) guidelines, and other declarations and rulings. Psychological experiments were discussed separately later - and now the whole world is guided by the annually updated recommendations of the American Psychological Association. We are talking about the most controversial (and simply inhuman) experiments with the psyche of humans and animals, which today would hardly have passed the test of the ethical committee.

Experiment "Little Albert"

It all happened in 1920 at Johns Hopkins University, where Professor John Watson and his graduate student Rosalie Reiner, inspired by the success of the Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov in the formation of conditioned reflexes in dogs, wanted to see if this was possible in humans. They conducted a study of classical conditioning (the creation of a conditioned reflex), trying to develop a reaction in a person to an object that was previously neutral. The study participant was a nine-month-old child, identified in the documents as "Albert B."

Checking the boy's reactions to objects and animals, Watson noticed that the kid felt special sympathy for the white rat. After several neutral displays, the demonstration of the white rat began to be accompanied by a blow of a hammer on metal - as a result, any subsequent demonstration of the white rat and other furry animals was accompanied by Albert's panic fear and a clearly negative reaction, even when there was no sound.

It is difficult to imagine what such manipulations with the psyche could turn out for the child - but we will not know about this: Albert is supposed to have died of an illness not related to the experiment at the age of six. In 2010, the American Psychological Association was able to identify "Albert B." - it turned out to be Douglas Merritt, the son of a local nurse, who received only a dollar for his participation in the study. Although there is a version that it could be a certain Albert Barger.

"The Witness Effect"

This experiment was carried out in 1968 by John Darley and Bibb Latane, showing an interest in witnesses to crimes who did nothing to help the victim. The authors were particularly interested in the murder of 28-year-old Kitty Genovese, who was beaten to death in front of many people who did not try to stop the perpetrator. A few caveats about this crime: First, it's important to keep in mind that the "38 witnesses" reported by The Times were not confirmed in court. Secondly, most of the witnesses, no matter how many there were, did not see the murder, but only heard incoherent screams and were sure that this was “an ordinary quarrel between acquaintances.”

Darley and Latane conducted an experiment in a classroom at Columbia University where each participant was asked to fill out a simple questionnaire, and after a while smoke began to seep into the room. that if the participant was alone in the room, they reported smoke much faster than if someone else was nearby. So the authors confirmed the existence of the "witness effect", which implies that "it is not I who should act, but others." Gradually, the experiments became less ethical - and from smoke as a test factor, Darley and Latane switched to using a recording with the voice of a person who needs urgent medical attention. Of course, without informing the participants of the experiment that the actor simulated a heart attack.

Milgram experiment

The author of this experiment, Stanley Milgram, said that he wanted to understand what forced respectable citizens of the Third Reich to participate in the brutal acts of the Holocaust. And how could the Gestapo officer Adolf Eichmann, responsible for the mass extermination of Jews, plead in court that he did not do anything special, but "just kept order."

A pair of "student" and "teacher" took part in each test. Although Milgram spoke of a random distribution of roles, in reality, the participant in the study always acted as the "teacher", and the hired actor turned out to be the "student". They were placed in adjacent rooms, and the "teachers" were asked to press a button that sent a small electric current to the "student" every time he gave an incorrect answer. The "teacher" knew that with each subsequent pressing, the discharge increased, as evidenced by groans and screams from the next room. In fact, there was no current, and screams and pleas were just a successful acting game - Milgram wanted how far a person endowed with unconditional power was ready to go. As a result, the scientist concluded that if the current discharges were real, most of the "teachers" would have killed their "students".

Despite the controversial ethical component, the Milgram experiment was recently repeated by Polish scientists, led by psychologist Tomasz Grzib. As in the original version, there was no current here, and the moderator continued to insist on continuing the experiment, using the phrases "you have no choice" and "you have to continue." In the end, 90% of the participants continued to press the button, despite the screams of a person in the next room. True, if a woman was in the role of a “student”, the “teachers” refused to continue three times more often than if a man was in her place.

Harlow's experiments with monkeys

In the 1950s, Harry Harlow of the University of Wisconsin studied infant addiction using baby rhesus monkeys. They were weaned from their mother, replacing her with two fake monkeys - made of cloth and wire. At the same time, the "mother" from a soft towel had no additional function, and the wire one fed the monkey from a bottle. The baby, however, spent most of the day with the soft "mother" and only about an hour a day next to the "mother" wire.

Harlow also used intimidation to prove that it was the "mother" that the monkey excreted from the tissue. He deliberately scared the monkeys by watching which of the models they would run to. In addition, he conducted experiments to isolate small monkeys from society to prove that those who did not learn to be part of a group in infancy would not be able to assimilate and mate when they got older. Harlow's experiments were terminated due to APA regulations aimed at ending cruelty to both humans and animals.

Experiment "Blue eyes - brown eyes"

Jane Elliott, an elementary school teacher from Iowa, conducted a study in 1968 to demonstrate that any kind of discrimination is unfair. Trying to explain to students what discrimination is the day after the assassination of Martin Luther King, she offered them an exercise that was included in psychology textbooks as "Blue eyes - brown eyes."

After dividing the class into groups, Elliott cited data from fake scientific studies that claimed that one group was superior to another in some way. For example, she could tell that blue-eyed people were more intelligent and quick-witted—and it soon became apparent that the group claimed to be superior at the beginning of the lesson was doing better on assignments and was more active than usual. The other group became more withdrawn and seemed to lose their sense of security. The ethics of this study are questioned (if only because people should be informed about their participation in the experiment), but some of the participants report that it changed their lives for the better, allowing them to experience what discrimination does to a person.

The stuttering experiment

In the late 1930s, speech researcher Wendell Johnson thought that a teacher who had once told him that he stuttered might be the cause of his stuttering. The assumption seemed strange and illogical, but Johnson decided to test whether value judgments could be the cause of speech problems. Taking graduate student Mary Taylor as an assistant, Johnson selected two dozen children from a local orphanage - they were ideally suited for the experiment due to the lack of parental authority figures.

The children were randomly divided into two groups: the first was told that their speech was excellent, and the second - that they had deviations and could not avoid stuttering. Despite the working hypothesis, not a single person in the group began to stutter at the end of the study - but the children had serious problems with self-esteem, anxiety, and even some signs of stuttering (which, however, disappeared after a few days). Experts now agree that this kind of suggestion can exacerbate stuttering that has already begun - but the roots of the problem are still to be found in neurological processes and genetic predisposition, and not in the rudeness of teachers or parents.

Stanford Prison Experiment

In 1971, Philip Zimbardo of Stanford University conducted the famous prison experiment to study group behavior and the impact of role on personality traits. Zimbardo and his team assembled a group of 24 students who were considered physically and mentally healthy and signed up to participate in a "psychological study of prison life" for $15 a day. Half of them, as is well known from the 2001 German film The Experiment and its 2010 American remake, became "prisoners" and the other half became "guards".

The experiment itself took place in the basement of Stanford's psychology department, where Zimbardo's team set up a makeshift prison. Participants were given a standard introduction to prison life, including advice for "guards" to avoid violence, but maintain order by all means. Already on the second day, the "prisoners" rebelled, barricaded themselves in their cells and ignored the "guards" - and the latter responded with violence. They began to divide "prisoners" into "good" and "bad" and came up with sophisticated punishments for them, including solitary confinement and public humiliation.

The experiment was supposed to last two weeks, but Zimbardo's future wife, psychologist Christina Maslakh, said on the fifth day: "I think what you are doing with these boys is terrible," so the experiment was stopped. Zimbardo received wide recognition and recognition - in 2012 he won another award, the gold medal of the American Psychological Foundation. And everything would be fine if not for one thing, but in the form of a recent publication that called into question the conclusions of this, and therefore thousands of other studies based on the Stanford experiment. Audio recordings remained from the experiment, and after their careful analysis, suspicions arose that the situation got out of control not spontaneously, but at the request of the experimenters.

Experiment "Third Wave"

Manipulating people is not so difficult if you do it gradually and rely on authority. This is evidenced by the "Third Wave" experiment, conducted in April 1967 in a California school with the participation of tenth graders. The author was the school history teacher Ron Jones, who wanted to answer the students' question about how people could follow Hitler, realizing what he was doing.

On Monday, he announced to the students that he planned to create a school youth group, and then he talked at length about how important discipline and obedience are in this matter. On Tuesday he talked about the power of unity, on Wednesday - about the power of action (already on the third day, several people from other classes joined the "movement"). On Thursday, when the teacher talked about the power of pride, 80 schoolchildren gathered in the audience, and on Friday, almost 200 people listened to a lecture on the "nationwide youth program for the good of the people."

The Master announced that there was no real movement, and all this was invented to show how easy it is to get carried away with the wrong idea, if it is presented correctly; the schoolchildren left the premises very depressed, and some with tears in their eyes. The fact that a spontaneous school experiment was carried out at all became known only in the late 70s, when Ron Jones spoke about it in one of his pedagogical works. And in 2011, the documentary film "Lesson Plan" was released in the United States - it shows interviews with participants in this experiment.

"John/Joan"

In our time, it is regularly about gender identification and that everyone has the right to decide this issue for himself. What will happen if the substitution is carried out without the knowledge of a person, for example, in childhood? One case that was not intended as an experiment, but became one, demonstrates that our sense of self is difficult to deceive - and clearly shows how terrible the consequences can be when a person is not allowed to live in harmony with his own gender.

Twins were born in a Canadian family, and one of them, Bruce, was circumcised at the age of seven months due to problems with urination. The operation was complicated, the penis was badly damaged and had to be removed. After that, the confused parents saw on TV a speech by Professor John Money, who talked about transgender and intersex people. Among other things, he said that the development of children who underwent "corrective" operations at an early age proceeds normally and they adapt well to a new gender. The Raymers approached Mani in person and heard the same thing: the psychologist advised them to have an operation to remove the genital glands and raise the child as a girl named Brenda.

The problem was that Brenda did not want to feel like a girl in any way: he did not feel comfortable urinating while sitting, and his figure retained masculine features, which, unfortunately, were mocked by peers. Despite this, John Money continued to publish articles in scientific journals (of course, without naming names), claiming that everything was fine with the child. As a teenager, Brenda had a new operation - this time to create an artificial vagina, in order to complete "". However, the teenager flatly refused to do this - and the parents finally told him what happened. By the way, the strongest emotional stress that people experienced during Brenda's growing up affected all family members: her mother suffered from depression, her father began to drink more and more often, and her brother closed in on himself.

Brenda's life was bleak: three suicide attempts, changing her name to David, rebuilding her identity, several reconstructive surgeries. David married and adopted his partner's three children, and this story gained fame in 2000 after the publication of John Colapinto's book "Nature made him this way: a boy who was raised as a girl." The story with a happy ending still did not work out: David's psychological difficulties did not go away, and after his brother's overdose, suicidal thoughts did not leave him. After quitting his job and separating from his wife, in May 2004 he committed suicide.

The human mind is a rather complex thing. Each of us perceives the world around us in our own way, and such things as instincts, upbringing and personal preferences often determine how a person will react to certain events. Since the time of Freud, psychologists have been trying to understand how the human psyche works, which in itself is not the easiest thing to do. Many psychological experiments can be dangerous and harm a person, because no one knows how he will behave in a given situation. Often, it is much easier to cause harm than to correct what has been done, so psychologists have a huge responsibility. Psychology has known both progress and failure throughout its existence. Today you will get acquainted with ten examples of psychological experiments that did not end at all as it was intended.

10 Stanford Prison Experiment

Psychology professor Philip Zimbardo in 1971 decided to conduct the Stanford prison experiment, during which it was supposed to study the effect of imprisonment on the human psyche. He hypothesized that the main cause of cruelty in prisons is the acquired personality traits of the prisoners themselves and their guards. The experiment involved 24 students who were to play the roles of prisoners and guards. The experiment itself was supposed to last two weeks, but was interrupted already on the 6th day due to the fact that the jailers behaved extremely unethically towards the prisoners. Prisoners were subjected to psychological torture, one-third of the guards even began to show "genuine sadistic tendencies", causing many prisoners to become emotionally traumatized. As a result of this experiment, it turned out that the very fact that a person is in prison has a much greater influence on his behavior than his personality traits.

9 Monstrous Research


At the University of Iowa in 1939, Professor Wendell Johnson and graduate student Mary Tudor recruited a group of 22 orphans to help them research stuttering. Their hypothesis was that often parents themselves label their children "stuttering" when in fact their speech is within the normal range. This behavior contributes to the development of real stuttering, even if initially the child was doing well. Almost half of all the children tested, who initially did not suffer from stuttering, began to suffer from this ailment after the experiment, they became withdrawn and consciously tried to speak as little as possible. In 2007, six children who participated in the experiment were awarded $925,000 in damages by the State of Iowa because it was recognized that the experience had left them with a series of emotional and psychological trauma.

8. David Reimer


When David Reimer was 8 months old, he underwent an unsuccessful circumcision operation and almost lost his penis. Psychologist John Money offered to give him a sex change operation and raise him as a girl. The Raymers agreed to this proposal, but there was something that Mani didn't tell them. He was going to use their son in an experiment that would prove his hypothesis that gender is an acquired trait and is generally determined by the upbringing and attitude towards the child. David was renamed Brenda and forced to take hormones. But, despite the fact that he was treated like a daughter in the family, David felt and behaved like a boy. At the age of 14, he learned the truth and decided to reclaim his original gender. At the age of 38, he committed suicide.

7. Therapy for homosexual rejection


In the 1960s, homosexual therapy was a fairly common practice aimed at turning men from homosexuals into heterosexuals. In 1966, a whole series of such experiments was carried out, the results of which were quite successful, although it later turned out that all the subjects were actually bisexual. One of the practices used in this experiment was to punish participants with electric shocks while watching homosexual pornography. This therapy was quite controversial and was found to cause psychological damage to the participants in the treatment, moreover, one of the test subjects even died due to numerous electric shocks.

6. Third wave


In 1967, history teacher Ron Jones decided to use a social experiment to show his students what Nazi Germany was like. He wanted to show them that even the most democratic society is not immune from manifestations of fascism. Jones called this experiment "The Third Wave" and constantly repeated to the audience their motto: "Strength through discipline, strength through community, strength through action, strength through pride." By the end of the third day, 200 people attended his lectures, and his students made sure that all newcomers followed the rules of their organization. Jones ended his experiment at the end of the fifth day, believing that his students had seen enough to understand how easy it was to fall into the trap of fascism. He himself never expected that his fictional fascist group would grow to such a large number so quickly.

5. Blue/brown eyes


In 1970, just after Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, third grade teacher Jane Elliott decided to teach her students about racism in a way that would make them understand how deep the problem was. She came up with the blue/brown eye game, dividing the class into groups according to their eye color, and then labeled the brown eyed students as an inferior race, demonstrating what people of color experience every day of their lives. This approach received a lot of criticism from society, Elliott received many angry letters where she was asked how she dared to do this to white children, because they were not ready for this, compared to black ones.

4. Milgram experiment


Stanley Milgram, a social psychologist at Yale University, wanted to do an experiment to test how the mechanism of obedience to authority works. Milgram's experiment was as follows: one person (the teacher) had to ask a question to another person (the listener), if he answered incorrectly, then the teacher beat him with an electric shock. The bottom line was that the teacher didn't know that the listener was actually an actor and that the electric current wasn't real. As a result, the following picture emerged for Milgram: while some teachers stopped this cruel experiment when the listener asked them to, 26 out of 40 people continued to deliver shocks of 450 volts only because, according to them, they simply could not stop. . Despite the fact that this experiment revealed the dark side of the human nature, most of the participants were glad to take part in it.

3. Pit of despair

"The Pit of Despair" was the nickname given to comparative psychologist Harry Harlow, who earned it from a construct he designed himself to detect clinical depression in monkeys. In his research, Harlow used monkeys between the ages of 3 months and 3 years, he kept them in a small cold solitary cell, placing them there after they began to develop a close bond with their mother. He observed them and documented the time intervals through which they showed the first signs of depression. His experiment was a success, after a certain time the isolated monkeys stopped playing and being active, and two of them even refused to eat and died of exhaustion. The society condemned Harlow for such methods, equating them with torture and calling them unnecessary and cruel. It was thanks to this experiment that laws began to appear in the world aimed at preventing cruelty to animals.

(banner_ads_inline)

2.MK-Ultra


MK-Ultra is the codename given to all illegal human experimentation programs run by the CIA. These experiments were usually intended to develop new drugs and methods that were later planned to be used in interrogation and torture. The experiments began in the 1950s and continued until 1973. In the process, the subjects were often injected with drugs such as LSD, and sometimes the victims did not even know about it. The purpose of these experiments was to find a drug that could affect the brain so that it gave out all the information, or completely "erase it", turning a person into an obedient robot. And although we know that many participants in such experiments died, the true extent of the harm caused by MK-Ultra, we are unlikely to ever know.

1. Landis experiment


In 1924, Carney Landis, a graduate of the psychology department, conducted a series of experiments with people's faces, trying to determine the presence of common features in the expression of certain emotions. Black lines were drawn on the faces of the volunteers, mostly students, so that one could easily follow the movements of the facial muscles under the influence of powerful stimuli. They were forced to watch pornography, sniff ammonia, put their hand in a bucket of frogs. Then a live rat was placed before them and ordered to behead it. Only one third of the volunteers complied with this order, and then, none of them could do it right, forcing the poor animal to die in terrible agony. As for those who refused to kill the rat, Landis personally decapitated it in front of them. The study did not reveal any universal facial movements, but again, for the umpteenth time, confirmed the existence of the dark side of human nature.

Man and the features of his personality have been the object of interest and study of the great minds of mankind for more than one century. And from the very beginning of the development of psychological science to the present day, people have managed to develop and significantly improve their skills in this difficult but exciting business. Therefore, now, in order to obtain reliable data in the study of the characteristics of the human psyche and his personality, people use a large number of various methods and methods of research in psychology. And one of the methods that have gained the greatest popularity and proven themselves from the most practical side is a psychological experiment.

We decided to consider individual examples of the most famous, interesting and even inhumane and shocking socio-psychological experiments that were carried out on people, regardless of the general material, due to their importance and significance. But at the beginning of this part of our course, we will once again recall what a psychological experiment is and what are its features, and also briefly touch on the types and characteristics of the experiment.

What is an experiment?

Experiment in psychology- this is a certain experience, which is carried out in special conditions, in order to obtain psychological data by interfering with the researcher in the process of the subject's activity. Both a specialist scientist and a simple layman can act as a researcher during the experiment.

The main characteristics and features of the experiment are:

• The ability to change any variable and create new conditions to identify new patterns;
• Possibility to choose a starting point;
• Possibility of repeated holding;
• The ability to include other methods of psychological research in the experiment: test, survey, observation, and others.

The experiment itself can be of several types: laboratory, natural, aerobatic, explicit, hidden, etc.

If you have not studied the first lessons of our course, then you will probably be interested to know that you can learn more about the experiment and other research methods in psychology in our lesson “Methods of Psychology”. Now we turn to the most famous psychological experiments.

The most famous psychological experiments

hawthorne experiment

The name Hawthorne experiment refers to a series of socio-psychological experiments that were carried out from 1924 to 1932 in the American city of Hawthorne at the Western Electrics factory by a group of researchers led by psychologist Elton Mayo. The prerequisite for the experiment was a decrease in labor productivity among factory workers. Studies that have been conducted on this issue have not been able to explain the reasons for this decline. Because factory management was interested in raising productivity, scientists were given complete freedom of action. Their goal was to identify the relationship between the physical conditions of work and the efficiency of workers.

After a long study, scientists came to the conclusion that labor productivity is influenced by social conditions and, mainly, the emergence of workers' interest in the work process, as a result of their awareness of their participation in the experiment. The mere fact that workers are singled out in a separate group and they receive special attention from scientists and managers already affects the efficiency of workers. By the way, during the Hawthorne experiment, the Hawthorne effect was revealed, and the experiment itself raised the authority of psychological research as scientific methods.

Knowing about the results of the Hawthorne experiment, as well as about the effect, we can apply this knowledge in practice, namely: to have a positive impact on our activities and the activities of other people. Parents can improve the development of their children, educators can improve student achievement, employers can improve the efficiency of their employees and productivity. To do this, you can try to announce that a certain experiment will take place, and the people to whom you announce this are its important component. For the same purpose, you can apply the introduction of any innovation. But you can learn more about it here.

And you can find out the details of the Hawthorne experiment.

Milgram experiment

The Milgram experiment was first described by an American social psychologist in 1963. His goal was to find out how much suffering some people can cause to others, and innocent people, provided that this is their job duties. The participants in the experiment were told that they were studying the effect of pain on memory. And the participants were the experimenter himself, the real subject ("teacher") and the actor who played the role of another subject ("student"). The “student” had to memorize the words from the list, and the “teacher” had to check his memory and, in case of an error, punish him with an electric discharge, each time increasing its strength.

Initially, the Milgram experiment was carried out in order to find out how the inhabitants of Germany could take part in the destruction of a huge number of people during the Nazi terror. As a result, the experiment clearly demonstrated the inability of people (in this case, "teachers") to resist the boss (researcher), who ordered the "work" to continue, despite the fact that the "student" suffered. As a result of the experiment, it was revealed that the need to obey authorities is deeply rooted in the human mind, even under the condition of internal conflict and moral suffering. Milgram himself noted that under the pressure of authority, adequate adults are able to go very far.

If we think for a while, we will see that, in fact, the results of the Milgram experiment tell us, among other things, about the inability of a person to independently decide what to do and how to behave when someone is “above” him higher in rank, status, etc. The manifestation of these features of the human psyche, unfortunately, very often leads to disastrous results. In order for our society to be truly civilized, people must learn to always be guided by a human attitude towards each other, as well as ethical norms and moral principles that their conscience dictates to them, and not the authority and power of other people.

You can get acquainted with the details of the Milgram experiment.

Stanford Prison Experiment

The Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted by American psychologist Philip Zimbardo in 1971 at Stanford. It explored a person's reaction to the conditions of imprisonment, the restriction of freedom and the impact on his behavior of an imposed social role. Funding was provided by the US Navy in order to explain the causes of conflicts in the Marine Corps and the Navy's correctional facilities. For the experiment, men were selected, some of whom became "prisoners", and the other part - "guards".

"Guards" and "prisoners" very quickly got used to their roles, and situations in a makeshift prison sometimes arose very dangerous. Sadistic inclinations were manifested in a third of the "guards", and the "prisoners" received severe moral injuries. The experiment, designed for two weeks, was stopped after six days, because. he started to get out of control. The Stanford prison experiment is often compared to the Milgram experiment we described above.

In real life, one can see how any justifying ideology supported by the state and society can make people overly receptive and submissive, and the power of authorities has a strong impact on the personality and psyche of a person. Watch yourself, and you will see visual confirmation of how certain conditions and situations affect your internal state and shape behavior more than the internal characteristics of your personality. It is very important to be able to always be yourself and remember your values ​​in order not to be influenced by external factors. And this can be done only with the help of constant self-control and awareness, which, in turn, need regular and systematic training.

Details of the Stanford Prison Experiment can be found by following this link.

Ringelmann experiment

The Ringelmann experiment (aka the Ringelmann effect) was first described in 1913 and carried out in 1927 by the French professor of agricultural engineering, Maximilian Ringelmann. This experiment was carried out out of curiosity, but revealed a pattern of decrease in people's productivity depending on the increase in the number of people in the group in which they work. For the experiment, a random selection of a different number of people was carried out to perform a certain job. In the first case, it was weight lifting, and in the second, tug of war.

One person could lift as much as possible, for example, a weight of 50 kg. Therefore, two people should have been able to lift 100 kg, because. the result should increase in direct proportion. But the effect was different: two people were able to lift only 93% of the weight that 100% of which could be lifted alone. When the group of people was increased to eight people, they only lifted 49% of the weight. In the case of tug of war, the effect was the same: an increase in the number of people reduced the percentage of efficiency.

It can be concluded that when we rely only on our own strengths, then we make maximum efforts to achieve the result, and when we work in a group, we often rely on someone else. The problem lies in the passivity of actions, and this passivity is more social than physical. Solitary work makes us reflex to get the most out of ourselves, and in group work the result is not so significant. Therefore, if you need to do something very important, then it is best to rely only on yourself and not rely on the help of other people, because then you will give your best "to the fullest" and achieve your goal, and other people are not so important what is important to you.

More information about the Ringelmann experiment/effect can be found here.

Experiment "I and others"

"Me and Others" is a Soviet popular science film of 1971, which features footage of several psychological experiments, the course of which is commented on by the announcer. The experiments in the film reflect the influence of the opinions of others on a person and his ability to think out what he could not remember. All experiments were prepared and conducted by psychologist Valeria Mukhina.

Experiments shown in the film:

• "Attack": the subjects must describe the details of an impromptu attack and recall the signs of the attackers.
• "Scientist or killer": the subjects are shown a portrait of the same person, having previously presented him as a scientist or a killer. Participants must make a psychological portrait of this person.
• “Both are white”: black and white pyramids are placed on the table in front of the child participants. Three of the children say that both pyramids are white, testing the fourth for suggestibility. The results of the experiment are very interesting. Later, this experiment was carried out with the participation of adults.
• "Sweet salty porridge": three-quarters of the porridge in the bowl is sweet, and one is salty. Three children are given porridge and they say it is sweet. The fourth is given a salty "site". Task: to check what the name of the porridge will be called by a child who has tasted a salty “site” when the other three say that it is sweet, thereby testing the importance of public opinion.
• "Portraits": participants are shown 5 portraits and asked to find out if there are two photos of the same person among them. At the same time, all participants, except for one who came later, must say that two different photos are a photo of the same person. The essence of the experiment is also to find out how the opinion of the majority affects the opinion of one.
• Shooting range: there are two targets in front of the student. If he shoots to the left, then a ruble will fall out, which he can take for himself, if to the right, then the ruble will go to the needs of the class. The left target initially had more hit marks. It is necessary to find out which target the student will shoot at if he sees that many of his comrades shot at the left target.

The overwhelming majority of the results of the experiments conducted in the film showed that for people (both for children and adults) what others say and their opinion is very important. So it is in life: very often we give up our beliefs and opinions when we see that the opinions of others do not coincide with our own. That is, we can say that we lose ourselves among the rest. For this reason, many people do not achieve their goals, betray their dreams, follow the lead of the public. You need to be able to maintain your individuality in any conditions and always think only with your head. After all, first of all, it will serve you well.

By the way, in 2010 a remake of this film was made, in which the same experiments were presented. If you wish, you can find both of these films on the Internet.

"Monsterous" experiment

A monstrous experiment was conducted in 1939 in the United States by psychologist Wendell Johnson and his graduate student Mary Tudor in order to find out how susceptible children are to suggestion. For the experiment, 22 orphans from the city of Davenport were selected. They were divided into two groups. The children from the first group were told about how wonderful and correct they were speaking, and they were praised in every possible way. The other half of the children were convinced that their speech was full of flaws, and they were called miserable stutterers.

The results of this monstrous experiment were also monstrous: in the majority of children from the second group, who did not have any speech defects, all the symptoms of stuttering began to develop and take root, which persisted throughout their later life. The experiment itself was hidden from the public for a very long time so as not to damage the reputation of Dr. Johnson. Then, nevertheless, people learned about this experiment. Later, by the way, similar experiments were carried out by the Nazis on concentration camp prisoners.

Looking at the life of modern society, sometimes you are amazed at how parents raise their children these days. You can often see how they scold their children, insult them, call them names, call them very unpleasant words. It is not surprising that people with a broken psyche and developmental disabilities grow out of young children. You need to understand that everything that we say to our children, and even more so if we say it often, will eventually find its reflection in their inner world and the formation of their personality. We need to carefully monitor everything that we say to our children, how we communicate with them, what kind of self-esteem we form and what values ​​we instill. Only healthy upbringing and true parental love can make our sons and daughters adequate people, ready for adulthood and able to become part of a normal and healthy society.

There is more information about the "monstrous" experiment.

Project "Aversion"

This terrible project was carried out from 1970 to 1989 in the South African army under the "leadership" of Colonel Aubrey Levin. It was a secret program designed to purge the ranks of the South African army from people of non-traditional sexual orientation. The "participants" of the experiment, according to official figures, were about 1,000 people, although the exact number of victims is unknown. To achieve a "good" goal, scientists used a variety of means: from drugs and electroshock therapy to castration with chemicals and sex reassignment surgery.

The Aversion project failed: it turned out to be impossible to change the sexual orientation of military personnel. And the “approach” itself was not based on any scientific evidence about homosexuality and transsexuality. Many of the victims of this project have never been able to rehabilitate themselves. Some committed suicide.

Of course, this project concerned only persons of non-traditional sexual orientation. But if we talk about those who are different from the rest in general, then we can often see that society does not want to accept people "not like" the rest. Even the slightest manifestation of individuality can cause ridicule, hostility, misunderstanding and even aggression from the majority of "normal". Each person is an individuality, a personality with its own characteristics and mental properties. The inner world of each person is a whole universe. We have no right to tell people how they should live, speak, dress, etc. We should not try to change them, if their “wrongness”, of course, does not harm the life and health of others. We must accept everyone for who they are, regardless of their gender, religion, political or even sexual affiliation. Everyone has the right to be themselves.

More details about the Aversion project can be found at this link.

Landis experiments

Landis's experiments are also called Spontaneous Facial Expressions and Subordination. A series of these experiments was carried out by psychologist Carini Landis in Minnesota in 1924. The purpose of the experiment was to identify the general patterns of work of facial muscle groups that are responsible for the expression of emotions, as well as to search for facial expressions characteristic of these emotions. The participants in the experiments were students of Landis.

For a more distinct display of facial expressions, special lines were drawn on the faces of the subjects. After that, they were presented with something capable of causing strong emotional experiences. For disgust, students sniffed ammonia, for excitement they watched pornographic pictures, for pleasure they listened to music, and so on. But the latest experiment, in which the subjects had to cut off the head of a rat, caused the widest resonance. And at first, many participants flatly refused to do it, but in the end they did it anyway. The results of the experiment did not reflect any regularity in the expressions of people's faces, but they showed how ready people are to obey the will of the authorities and are able, under this pressure, to do what they would never do under normal conditions.

It’s the same in life: when everything is fine and goes as it should, when everything goes on as usual, then we feel confident in ourselves as people, have our own opinion and preserve our individuality. But as soon as someone puts pressure on us, most of us immediately cease to be ourselves. Landis' experiments once again proved that a person easily "bends" under others, ceases to be independent, responsible, reasonable, etc. In fact, no authority can force us to force us to do what we do not want. Especially if it entails causing harm to other living beings. If every person is aware of this, then it is quite likely that this will be able to make our world much more humane and civilized, and life in it - more comfortable and better.

You can learn more about Landis' experiments here.

Little Albert

An experiment called "Little Albert" or "Little Albert" was conducted in New York in 1920 by psychologist John Watson, who, by the way, is the founder of behaviorism - a special direction in psychology. The experiment was conducted in order to find out how fear is formed on objects that had not caused any fear before.

For the experiment, they took a nine-month-old boy named Albert. For some time he was shown a white rat, a rabbit, cotton wool and other white objects. The boy played with the rat and got used to it. After that, when the boy started playing with the rat again, the doctor would hit the metal with a hammer, causing the boy a very unpleasant feeling. After a certain period of time, Albert began to avoid contact with the rat, and even later, at the sight of a rat, as well as cotton wool, a rabbit, etc. started crying. As a result of the experiment, it was suggested that fears are formed in a person at a very early age and then remain for life. As for Albert, his unreasonable fear of a white rat remained with him for the rest of his life.

The results of the "Little Albert" experiment, firstly, remind us again how important it is to pay attention to any little things in the process of raising a child. Something that seems to us at first glance quite insignificant and overlooked, can in some strange way be reflected in the psyche of the child and develop into some kind of phobia or fear. When raising children, parents should be extremely attentive and observe everything that surrounds them and how they react to it. Secondly, thanks to what we now know, we can identify, understand and work through some of our fears, the cause of which we cannot find. It is quite possible that what we are unreasonably afraid of came to us from our own childhood. And how nice it can be to get rid of some fears that tormented or simply bothered in everyday life?!

You can learn more about the Little Albert experiment here.

Learned (learned) helplessness

Acquired helplessness is a mental state in which the individual does absolutely nothing to somehow improve his situation, even having such an opportunity. This state appears mainly after several unsuccessful attempts to influence the negative effects of the environment. As a result, a person refuses any action to change or avoid a harmful environment; the feeling of freedom and faith in one's own strength are lost; depression and apathy appear.

This phenomenon was first discovered in 1966 by two psychologists: Martin Seligman and Steve Mayer. They conducted experiments on dogs. The dogs were divided into three groups. The dogs from the first group sat in the cages for a while and were released. Dogs from the second group were subjected to small electric shocks, but were given the opportunity to turn off the electricity by pressing the lever with their paws. The third group was subjected to the same shocks, but without the possibility of turning it off. After some time, the dogs from the third group were placed in a special aviary, from which it was easy to get out by simply jumping over the wall. In this enclosure, the dogs were also subjected to electric shocks, but they continued to remain in place. This told the scientists that the dogs had developed "learned helplessness" and became confident that they were helpless in the face of the outside world. After the scientists concluded that the human psyche behaves in a similar way after several failures. But was it worth it to torture dogs in order to find out what, in principle, we all have known for so long?

Probably, many of us can recall examples of confirmation of what the scientists proved in the above experiment. Every person in life can have a losing streak when it seems that everything and everyone is against you. These are moments when you give up, you want to give up everything, stop wanting something better for yourself and your loved ones. Here you need to be strong, show fortitude of character and fortitude. It is these moments that temper us and make us stronger. Some people say that this is how life tests strength. And if this test is passed steadfastly and with a proudly raised head, then luck will be favorable. But even if you don't believe in such things, just remember that it's not always good or always bad. one always replaces the other. Never lower your head and do not betray your dreams, they, as they say, will not forgive you for this. In difficult moments of life, remember that there is a way out of any situation and you can always “jump over the wall of the enclosure”, and the darkest hour is before dawn.

You can read more about what is learned helplessness and about experiments related to this concept.

Boy raised like a girl

This experiment is one of the most inhuman in history. It, so to speak, was held from 1965 to 2004 in Baltimore (USA). In 1965, a boy named Bruce Reimer was born there, whose penis was damaged during a circumcision procedure. Parents, not knowing what to do, turned to psychologist John Money and he "recommended" them to simply change the sex of the boy and raise him as a girl. The parents followed the "advice", gave permission for the sex change operation and began to raise Bruce as Brenda. In fact, Dr. Mani has long wanted to conduct an experiment to prove that gender is due to upbringing, and not nature. The boy Bruce became his guinea pig.

Despite the fact that Mani noted in his reports that the child grows up as a full-fledged girl, parents and school teachers argued that, on the contrary, the child shows all the properties of a boy's character. Both the parents of the child and the child himself experienced extreme stress for many years. A few years later, Bruce-Brenda nevertheless decided to become a man: he changed his name and became David, changed his image and performed several operations to “return” to male physiology. He even got married and adopted his wife's children. But in 2004, after breaking up with his wife, David committed suicide. He was 38 years old.

What can be said about this "experiment" in relation to our daily life? Probably, only that a person is born with a certain set of qualities and predispositions, determined by genetic information. Fortunately, not many people try to make daughters out of their sons or vice versa. But, nevertheless, while raising their child, some parents do not seem to want to notice the peculiarities of the character of their child and his emerging personality. They want to "sculpt" the child, as if from plasticine - to make him the way they themselves want to see him, without taking into account his individuality. And this is unfortunate, because. it is because of this that many people in adulthood feel their unfulfillment, frailty and meaninglessness of being, do not enjoy life. The small finds confirmation in the big, and any influence we have on children will be reflected in their future life. Therefore, it is worth being more attentive to your children and understanding that every person, even the smallest one, has his own path and you need to try with all your might to help him find it.

And some details of the life of David Reimer himself are here at this link.

The experiments considered by us in this article, as you might guess, represent only a small part of the total number ever carried out. But even they show us, on the one hand, how multifaceted and little studied the personality of a person and his psyche. And, on the other hand, what a great interest a person arouses in himself, and how much effort is made so that he can know his nature. Despite the fact that such a noble goal was often achieved by far from noble means, one can only hope that a person has somehow succeeded in his aspiration, and experiments that are harmful to a living being will cease to be carried out. We can say with confidence that it is possible and necessary to study the psyche and personality of a person for many more centuries, but this should be done only on the basis of considerations of humanism and humanity.

Last update: 09/12/2018

Material on an article in the journal Russian Reporter, dedicated to the 100th anniversary of social psychology.

Observers excite us

American psychologist Norman Triplett had a habit of walking in the park in the morning. One day, he noticed that cyclists passing by were going faster when there were a lot of people around, and slower when the park was deserted. “It turns out that the presence of other people changes behavior ...”, thought Triplett and decided to test this experimentally.

He invited the volunteers to wind the fishing line on the spinning reel. In one case, this had to be done in an empty room, in the other, there were people around. It turned out that the coil spins much better in the team. It seems that the hypothesis was confirmed.

But it's not so simple. Other social psychologists undertook to repeat this experiment, giving the subjects a variety of tasks - putting on clothes, solving problems, memorizing words. The results were contradictory. Sometimes the presence of other people made the work easier, and sometimes it was quite the opposite. The psychologists scratched their heads and frowned.

The answer was found only a few decades later. Robert Zajonc suggested that the presence of witnesses increases a person's arousal and helps to perform simple actions, such as putting on a shirt or building associations at the level of "poet - Pushkin, fruit - apple." In the language of psychologists, this is called - "dominant reaction." If we are talking about complex creative tasks, for example, solving an unusual mathematical equation or composing a poetic ode in honor of the president's anniversary, then the presence of others noticeably worsens the results. Zajonc's hypothesis was supported by the results of almost 300 studies involving more than 25,000 volunteers.

Time Norman Triplett forced volunteers to reel in the fishing line at the very end of the 19th century. The phrase "social psychology" was not yet in use. But it is this experiment that is considered the first "correct" socio-psychological study. And experiments to confirm / refute it then continued for more than half a century.

Moral Our psychology is changed by the very fact of the presence of other people. By the way, this effect works even when there is no one around, and we only imagine the presence of observers.

Where it can be encountered Yes, anywhere. During the day, we alternately find ourselves in a group, then alone. And, for example, in most offices they are very fond of putting several dozens (if not hundreds) of employees in huge open rooms, where everyone is in full view of everyone. Maximum insulation - transparent walls. So, perhaps, the cohesion of the team should be achieved. Obviously, the directors of these companies are not very interested in the creative work of their subordinates.

Psychology is stronger than the organization of work

This was at a time when all of America was fascinated by the scientific organization of labor. A group of psychologists was invited to the Western Electric plant in Hawthorne. As guinea pigs, they were assigned a team of pickers. And psychologists began to experiment.

Increased lighting in the workshop - productivity increased.

Allowed to take breaks more often - productivity has increased.

We made the lunch break longer - productivity increased ...

Any reform led to the fact that the young ladies worked better. Even as psychologists began to reverse the changes—lowering the light, taking fewer breaks, cutting lunch time, and so on—productivity continued to rise.

Scientists are still arguing why this happened. Most likely, the very fact of the experiment influenced the workers: they were assigned to a special group, the authorities communicated with them more attentively, and the whole factory followed their results.

Time Experiments at the Hawthorne plant continued from 1924 to 1936. True, at first the tone was set by representatives of the "scientific school of labor organization", founded by engineer Frederick Taylor. But when their research came to a standstill, they had to call in psychologists and anthropologists.

Moral Psychology can affect productivity much more than the conditions in the workplace and the organization of production. After the Hawthorne experiment, a general interest arose in the psychology of management. The course "human relations" is now taught in all business schools. True, it seems that many of our bosses in this subject had a triple with a minus.

Where it is possible to face it First of all - at work. Sometimes the phrase: “The success of our business depends on you” has a stronger impact on productivity than, say, installing a new fancy computer in the workplace.

Obey to the last knife switch

Imagine a respectable American who volunteers to study the mechanisms of memory. A respectable psychologist in a white coat shows him a device with 30 switches on the panel. Above each hangs a tag indicating the level of discharge - from 15 to 450 volts (on the label - significant XXX).

Pulling the switches, the participant in the experiment punishes another subject, the “student”, sitting behind the glass, with a shock every time he inaccurately repeats the word combinations just read out. After each mistake, the "teacher" presses a more powerful lever. When the discharge reaches a couple of hundred volts, the “student” screams that he has a bad heart and is not feeling well ...

The "teacher" is confused.

Maybe we should stop, - he addresses the organizer of the experiment.

These are our conditions. Go on, - the psychologist replies with a deadpan look.

The teacher continues. Each time the screams become more and more desperate.

210 volts: “Oh! Release me! I'm over it! I no longer want to participate in your experiment!”

225 volts: "Oh!"

270 volts: “Let me out! Let me out of here! Release! Let me out of here! What, don't you hear?! Let me out!”

330 volts - loud incessant cries of an agonizing person: “Let me out of here! Release! I'm having a heart attack! I ask you to! (Hysterically.) Let me out! You have no right to keep me here! Release! Release! Release me! Let me out!”

345 volts: silence.

360 volts: silence...

This is how the classic experiment of the American psychologist Stanley Milgram, carried out in the mid-60s, looked like. Of course, there was no electric discharge, the “student” actor portrayed writhing, and the tape recorder emitted screams. However, the “teachers” believed that everything that happened was real.

Before the experiment, Milgram asked his friends psychologists, sociologists, psychiatrists: how many people will reach the limit? Most of the experts argued: one out of a hundred, and even that one will be with mental disabilities.

In fact, 63% of volunteer "teachers" pulled the last switch. It turned out that two-thirds of respectable American citizens are ready to send an innocent person to the next world only because someone ordered them to do so.

There is no need to think that the subjects were pathological sadists: quite respectable citizens without any psychological deviations were selected to participate in the experiment. And their behavior cannot be attributed to the national characteristics of Americans - the Milgram experiment was repeated more than once in various countries (Australia, Jordan, Spain, Germany). The results were about the same.

The time is 1963. Many associate Milgram's experiments with the trial of Adolf Eichmann, which ended a year earlier. Recall that Eichmann was one of the main organizers of the extermination of Jews in Nazi Germany. When he appeared before the court in Israel, his main argument was: "I'm not guilty, I was just following orders." It seems that if Milgram conducted his experiments in our time, then an analogy with the case of Ulman, the commander of a group of special forces who shot peaceful Chechens, would be more appropriate. In court, he also insisted: "We were just following orders."

Moral Commenting on the results of his experiment, Milgram said gloomily: "If a system of camps were established in the United States on the model of Nazi Germany, suitable personnel for them could be recruited in any American town of medium size." Unfortunately, we can add that with equal probability this town can be Chinese, French or Russian.

Where can you encounter this? It is to be hoped that nowhere. However, judging by the results of experiments, no society is immune from the transition to monstrous violence. And this transition is easier than we think.

Foot in the door

Imagine that you live in your own house in some

small town. And suddenly a certain social activist comes to you and offers to install a rather ugly poster on your site: “Be careful on the roads!”. It is quite logical that 83% of respectable citizens answered this with a polite (or not very) refusal.

Another group of test subjects were first asked to do a small favor - sign a petition urging them to be careful on the roads. Signing is an easy task. And almost everyone agreed to this request. When, two weeks later, they were approached with a request to install a poster at the polling station, only 24% refused. That is, the preliminary fulfillment of a non-burdensome request increased the agreement by almost four times. This effect is called "foot-in-the-door".

Moral Having achieved from a person the feeling of involvement in this or that action, it is much easier to demand from him more and more new victims.

Where it can be encountered First we are asked to do something very simple (put a signature, vote, come to the rally). Then we are offered to do something more significant, and we semiconsciously reason: “Since I signed, it means that I support this (the president, the company, the party), because I am a free and reasonable citizen. So, I must be consistent in my support, even if it contradicts something (conscience, common sense, the safety of the wallet).

vast minority

The conclusion about obedience to the majority looks, of course, sad. As a consolation, we can cite the results of an experiment conducted by the classic of French social psychology, Serge Moscovici.

The conditions were similar to Ash's experiment: you had to say what color the card was. But this time, only two of the six people were "decoys". And this couple were real dissidents. Instead of the obvious blue, they stubbornly called green, etc.

And although the dissidents were in a clear minority, they managed to shift the opinions of others. After a series of experiments, Moscovici deduced the factors that determine the success of dissidents in society. For example, confidence and constancy of statements are very important.

A minority is more likely to win if its opinion on all other issues agrees with the opinion of the majority and differs only on one point (for example, when dissenters completely agree with the team on squares and triangles, but stubbornly stand their ground when discussing ovals ).

In addition, it is very important to win over at least one representative of the majority. In a number of experiments, it was found that as soon as defectors appear, everyone else immediately follows them, causing an avalanche effect.

Time Moscovici's first experiments took place in 1969. The student revolutions in France, Germany and some other countries have just ended. Another surge in the struggle for women's rights, ecology and other beautiful things began. It's time to analyze the effect of minority influence.

Moral The minority can win. We now seem to have a democracy, a republic, a market economy, women have equal rights with men ... But once all this was very dubious ideas that were preached only by a handful of marginals.

Where it can be encountered In any public discussion - from the level of the department to everything

the population of the country. So if you are in the minority - do not be embarrassed, you have a chance to win. At least the science is on your side.

Cheap labor is better

In an experiment by the American psychologist Leon Festinger, subjects spent two hours doing completely meaningless work - laying out coils on a tray, and then pouring them into a box. When this Sisyphean project was coming to an end, Festinger asked the participants to go to the other subjects waiting outside the door and tell them about how useful and interesting this work was. A reward was offered for this outright lie. In some cases, 1 dollar, in others - 20.

After two weeks, the subjects were asked how much they really liked this idiotic job. It turned out that those who received $ 1 were much more enthusiastic. They talked about how laying out the coils develops hand motor skills, helps to concentrate, and in general this is a damn pleasant and useful activity. Festinger explained the results obtained by the fact that a person always needs a justification for his actions. For $20 you can still lie, but for $1 it’s somehow humiliating to lie and you have to convince yourself that it wasn’t really a lie.

The time is 1959. During this period, it has already become clear to many that direct material gain is far from everything that affects a person’s actions and beliefs.

Morality Leon Festinger is famous for his theory of cognitive dissonance. Roughly speaking, a person has a set of contradictory knowledge in his head: “this work is boring”, “I am an honest person”, “I said that this work is interesting”, “I received a very small reward for this lie”. To resolve the contradiction, you need to change something in this set. For example, replace "this work is boring" with "this work seemed interesting to me", and then the contents of the skull will return to a state of harmony.

Where it can be encountered In any activity that is on the verge of leisure and work. If everyone was paid a regular salary for blogging or going to the gym, then many of these activities would seem much less exciting.

Group pressure can deceive the eye

This experiment is very popular in schools and universities around the world. Fortunately, this requires quite a bit: only two cardboard boxes, one of which shows three lines, the other one. The subject is required to say which of the three lines drawn together is equal in length to the line drawn separately. A simple task.

But ... Before giving a completely obvious answer, the subject must listen to the answers of his five colleagues. And they all call the absolutely wrong option as one. What to do?! On the one hand, no one requires that all answers match, and the eyes clearly see the correct option. On the other hand... In general, at least a third of the subjects show conformism and name the wrong option offered by the rest of the study participants. By the way, they are not subjects at all, but accomplices of the experimenter.

This result amazed even the organizer of the experiment - Solomon Ash. He was sure that the citizens of the United States, brought up in the spirit of individualism, should not succumb to the pressure of the group. But human nature turned out to be stronger than the traditions of freethinking.

The fact that a person submits to group pressure is nothing new. More interesting modification of the experiment. For example, in one of the versions there was a decoy subject who called the wrong option, which was different from the others (for example, the correct answer is “second line”, four participants say “third”, and one says “first”). When the “stationary” group lost its unity, the “naive” subjects gave much more correct answers.

Time The results of the experiment were published in 1951. The Second World War had recently ended, American society was in euphoria: we defeated totalitarian fascism, our people are free and independent, we can never have this! .. Ash's experiment was a blow to this self-confidence.

Moral Unity of opinion is a dangerous thing. In order to adequately perceive reality, there must be dissidents in society, and it is not so important whether they are telling the truth or are talking nonsense, the main thing is that their opinion differs from the position of the majority.

Where can you encounter it When evaluating world events, when choosing a book in a store, when voting in an election, when buying a new mobile phone ...

The Good Samaritan Goes Nowhere

John Darley and Daniel Batson got the idea for this experiment from the biblical parable of the Good Samaritan, in which a priest and a Levite (both very important and busy people) pass a wounded wanderer on the road, leaving him in the care of a humble (and supposedly less busy) Samaritan.

So, the seminary students are getting ready to give their first sermon in their lives. To do this, they need to go into a building located a few blocks away. One group of seminarians is admonished with the words: “You are late, they have been waiting for you for several minutes, so it’s better to hurry,” and the other is told: “You have some time left, but nothing will happen if you come early.”

On the way, the seminarians stumble upon a man who is reclining on the side of the road, groaning slightly and coughing. Of those who were advised to hurry, only 10% came to the aid of the unfortunate man (who, of course, was an accomplice of psychologists). And among the seminarians who believed that they had plenty of time, 63% of them turned out to be like that.

Such a small detail as the presence or absence of time changed the level of responsiveness by as much as 6 times and turned out to be stronger than moral qualities and religious education.

By the way, the theme of the sermon does not affect the behavior of the seminarians: in one case they had to talk about helping their neighbor (using the parable of the Samaritan as an example), in the other they had to talk about marital fidelity. In both groups, the results were about the same.

The time is 1973. For a long time, psychologists tried to "classify" each person. Armed with thousands of tests, they confidently made a diagnosis: this one was “intellectual” and “impulsive,” and that one was “open” and “soft.” But by the end of the 60s, it became clear to many that all the "calculated" personality traits rarely help predict a person's behavior in a particular situation.

Moral In science there is a concept with a cumbersome name: "the fundamental error of causal attribution." To put it simply, when evaluating the actions of others, we too often attribute their causes to the personal qualities of a person - dishonesty, callousness, aggressiveness, etc. And at the same time, we tend to take into account the influence of the external situation less than necessary. But it turns out that such a trifle as an excess or lack of time can greatly change the behavior of people. Even if they have chosen a career of professional service to God and love of neighbor.

Where it can be encountered Anywhere. When evaluating your friends, relatives or some public figures. Do not rush to make a "diagnosis". Under the pressure of the situation, the "stupid guy" can turn out to be a real intellectual, and the "most liberal politician" - a bloody dictator.

How to quarrel and how to reconcile

Why does one group of people suddenly start to hate another? Psychologist Muzafer Sherif tried to solve this somewhat naive question. He spent his childhood in the Turkish city of Izmir. In 1919, Greek troops entered there. A massacre began, many of his housemates were killed. According to the scientist himself, the Greek soldier had already raised his bayonet over Muzafer, but at the last moment he changed his mind and left the thirteen-year-old teenager alive. And three years later, a new massacre began in Izmir, only this time the Turkish military killed and raped Armenians and Greeks ...

When Sheriff moved to the United States, he decided to simulate inter-group conflict in a summer camp for schoolchildren. He divided teenagers unfamiliar with each other into two squads: "Rattlesnakes" and "Eagles". After that, a situation of constant competition was created. In any competition, only one of the teams could win, only one group could win the prize for participation in the competition, etc. The victory of some inevitably meant the loss of others.

Soon a real enmity began between the guys. It got to the point of a fight. Members of each team became more and more united among themselves and hated competitors more and more. When the Eagles were asked to describe one of the Rattlesnakes, they used words like "cowards," "know-it-alls," and "scum."

"Snakes" reciprocated them. After that, the Sheriff began to create problem situations that could only be solved by the combined forces of the two teams. For example, a bus “accidentally” broke down, and it was only possible to push it out of the ditch together. As a result, the conflict disappeared, and the guys from both teams

went home quite satisfied with each other.

Time Early 50s. Examples of intergroup conflicts could be easily found. In the Hindu-Muslim massacre in India alone in 1947, hundreds of thousands of people died in a matter of weeks.

Moral It takes a little to rally a group and set it against another. In another experiment, a rigid division into "friend or foe" arose only because some participants were hung green squares on their chests, and blue triangles were hung on others.

Where you can encounter it Almost every day we meet with the division of the world into “ours” and “not ours”. At the same time, both visitors from the Caucasus and employees of the neighboring department can turn out to be evil “not ours”. The laws of social psychology work the same way both there and there.

Prison in the basement of the university

How long does it take to turn a good-natured informal student into a cruel prison guard? It took Philip Zimbardo only five days. He created a semblance of a real prison in the basement of Stanford University. She looked quite natural: cast-iron gratings, viewing windows, in the cells of furniture - only beds. Volunteer test subjects were placed there, who were divided into “prisoners” and “guards” by a simple toss of a coin. At first, it all seemed like a game.

But very soon the students began to get used to the role. Three days later, the lion's share of conversations in the cells was devoted not to real life, but to prison conditions, rations, beds. On their own initiative, the "guards" tightened the rules every day. Recent pacifists became Cerberus. The “prisoners” were forced to wash toilets with their bare hands, they were handcuffed and forced to march naked through the hall…

One of the “guards” wrote in his diary: “No. 416 refuses to eat sausage ... We throw him into the punishment cell, ordering him to hold a sausage in each hand. I pass by and beat with a club on the door of the punishment cell. I decided to force feed him, he did not eat. I smeared food on his face. I couldn't believe I was doing this."

Philip Zimbardo, who acted as the "prison manager", also got used to the role.

The situation was turned by the bride of the psychologist Christina Maslach. On the fifth day of the study, she came to see her future husband's experiment. And the first thing that caught her eye was a line of prisoners who were being led to the toilet in formation, with bags over their heads.

Have you seen our circus? - asked the psychologist.

What you are doing to these guys is terrible, Christina burst into tears.

It became clear that the situation was out of control. And on the fifth day the experiment was terminated, although it was designed for two weeks.

We asked Professor Zimbardo: would he agree to conduct an experiment if he knew how much his participants would change?

Yes, of course, because this experiment gives us an idea of ​​how far a person can go in such a situation. True, if I had known everything from the very beginning, I would have stopped the experiment earlier, before sadism began to appear in the “guards”, and the slavish pathology of the worldview began to appear in the “prisoners”.

He admitted that he was going to repeat the prison experiment, wanting to compare the behavior of "wardens" who had received different training. However, the university authorities decided to refrain from such experiments.

The authorities at first actively responded to Zimbardo's research. He was invited to the state congress. Coming to the podium, the first thing Zimbardo said: “I put your son in my prison, and he could not stand there for even a week. What can we expect from guys who spend years in prisons much worse than mine?

Based on Zimbardo's research in Germany in 2001, the feature film "Experiment" (Das Experiment) was filmed. True, for some reason the name Zimbardo is not mentioned in the credits, and the reproduction of the experiment continues only in the first two thirds of the film - then fiction begins with an abundance of blood and massacre. An American film is due out this year and is being produced by Madonna's Maverick Films. It is known that the director will be Christopher McQuarrie, and the budget of the film will be $11 million.

The time is 1971. In the scientific community, discussions about experiments that have revealed a person's tendency to obedience and conformism do not subside. Critics argue that their terms were too artificial. Zimbardo wanted to show how these effects work in a situation as close to reality as possible.

Moral Zimbardo's experiment is very spectacular and spectacular, but in fact it is very difficult to analyze. “Guards” and “prisoners” are affected by many factors: role stereotypes, uncertainty of the situation, isolation, impersonality, etc. But the general conclusion is extremely simple: we cannot even imagine how quickly and dramatically the situation can change our personality. Moreover, whether we find ourselves downtrodden by “prisoners” or cruel “guards” is sometimes decided by a simple toss of a coin.

Where this can be encountered, the “prison effect” can work (albeit not so expressively) in more humane positions: director, teacher, security guard, etc.

"A Monstrous Experiment"

In 1939, Wendell Johnson of the University of Iowa (USA) and his graduate student Mary Tudor conducted a shocking experiment involving 22 orphans from Davenport. Children were divided into control and experimental groups. Half of the children were told by the experimenters about how clean and correct they were speaking. Unpleasant moments awaited the second half of the children: Mary Tudor, not sparing epithets, caustically ridiculed the slightest flaw in their speech, in the end calling everyone pathetic stutterers.

As a result of the experiment, many children who had never experienced problems with speech and, by the will of fate, ended up in the “negative” group, developed all the symptoms of stuttering, which persisted throughout their lives. The experiment, later called "monstrous", was hidden from the public for a long time for fear of damaging Johnson's reputation: similar experiments were later carried out on concentration camp prisoners in Nazi Germany.

In 2001, Iowa State University issued a formal apology to all those affected by the study.

Project “Aversion”

In the South African army, from 1970 to 1989, a secret program was carried out to clear the army ranks from military personnel of non-traditional sexual orientation. All means went in: from electroshock treatment to chemical castration. The exact number of victims is not known, however, according to army doctors, about 1,000 military personnel were subjected to various prohibited experiments on human nature during the “purges”. Army psychiatrists, on behalf of the command, did their best to “extirpate” homosexuals: those who did not succumb to “treatment” were sent to shock therapy, forced to take hormonal drugs, and even subjected to sex change operations. In most cases, the “patients” were young white males between the ages of 16 and 24. The then head of the “study”, Dr. Aubrey Levin, is now a professor of psychiatry at the University of Calgary (Canada). Engaged in private practice.

Stanford Prison Experiment

In 1971, the “artificial prison” experiment was not conceived by its creator as something unethical or harmful to the psyche of its participants, but the results of this study shocked the public. The famous psychologist Philip Zimbardo decided to study the behavior and social norms of individuals placed in atypical prison conditions and forced to play the roles of prisoners or guards.

For this purpose, an imitation prison was set up in the basement of the Faculty of Psychology, and 24 student volunteers were divided into “prisoners” and “guards”. It was assumed that the "prisoners" were initially placed in a situation in which they would experience personal disorientation and degradation, up to complete depersonalization. The "guards" were not given any special instructions regarding their roles. At first, the students did not really understand how they should play their roles, but on the second day of the experiment, everything fell into place: the uprising of the “prisoners” was brutally suppressed by the “guards”.

Since then, the behavior of both sides has changed radically. The “guards” have developed a special system of privileges designed to divide the “prisoners” and instill in them distrust of each other - they are not as strong alone as together, which means that it is easier to “guard” them. It began to seem to the “guards” that the “prisoners” were ready to raise a new “uprising” at any moment, and the control system was tightened to an extreme degree: the “prisoners” were not left alone even in the toilet.

As a result, the “prisoners” began to experience emotional distress, depression, and helplessness. After some time, the “prison priest” came to visit the “prisoners”. When asked what their names were, the “prisoners” most often gave their numbers, not their names, and the question of how they were going to get out of prison led them to a dead end.

To the horror of the experimenters, it turned out that the “prisoners” completely got used to their roles and began to feel like they were in a real prison, and the “guards” experienced real sadistic emotions and intentions towards the “prisoners”, who had been their good friends a few days ago. Both sides seemed to have completely forgotten that this was all just an experiment. Although the experiment was scheduled for two weeks, it was terminated early, after just six days, for ethical reasons.

Research on the effects of drugs on the body

It must be admitted that some animal experiments help scientists invent drugs that can save tens of thousands of human lives in the future.

However, some studies cross all the boundaries of ethics. An example is a 1969 experiment designed to help scientists understand the speed and degree of human addiction to drugs. The experiment was carried out on rats and monkeys, as on animals that are closest to humans in terms of physiology. Animals were taught to self-inject themselves with a dose of a certain drug: morphine, cocaine, codeine, amphetamines, etc.

As soon as the animals learned to “inject” themselves, the experimenters left them a large amount of drugs, left the animals to themselves and began observation. The animals were so confused that some of them even tried to escape, and, being under the influence of drugs, they were crippled and did not feel pain.

The monkeys who took cocaine began to suffer from convulsions and hallucinations: the unfortunate animals pulled out their knuckles. Monkeys, “sitting” on amphetamines, pulled out all their hair. Animals-"drugs", preferring the "cocktail" of cocaine and morphine, died within 2 weeks after the start of the drugs.

While the goal of the experiment was to understand and evaluate the effects of drugs on the human body with the intent of further developing effective drug addiction treatment, the way the results are achieved is hardly humane.

Landis Experiments: Spontaneous Facial Expressions and Subordination

In 1924, Carini Landis of the University of Minnesota began studying human facial expressions. The experiment, started by the scientist, was to reveal the general patterns of work of the facial muscle groups responsible for the expression of individual emotional states, and to find facial expressions typical of fear, embarrassment or other emotions (if we consider typical facial expressions characteristic of most people). The subjects were his own students.

To make facial expressions more distinct, he drew lines on the faces of the subjects with a burnt cork, after which he presented them with something that could evoke strong emotions: he made them sniff ammonia, listen to jazz, look at pornographic pictures and put their hands in buckets of toads. At the moment of expressing emotions, students were photographed.

And everything would be fine, but the last test, which Landis subjected students to, caused rumors in the widest circles of psychologists. Landis asked each subject to cut off the head of a white rat. All participants in the experiment initially refused to do this, many cried and screamed, but later most of them agreed to do it.

The worst thing was that most of the participants in the experiment, as they say, did not offend a fly in life and had absolutely no idea how to carry out the experimenter's order. As a result, the animals suffered a lot. The consequences of the experiment turned out to be much more important than the experiment itself. Scientists failed to find any regularity in facial expressions, however, psychologists received evidence of how easily people are ready to obey authorities and do what they would not have done in a normal life situation.

Little Albert

John Watson, the father of the behavioral trend in psychology, was engaged in research on the nature of fears and phobias. In 1920, while studying the emotions of infants, Watson, among other things, became interested in the possibility of forming a fear reaction in relation to objects that had not previously caused fear. The scientist tested the possibility of forming an emotional reaction of fear of a white rat in a 9-month-old boy Albert, who was not afraid of a rat at all and even liked to play with it. During the experiment, for two months, an orphan baby from a shelter was shown a tame white rat, a white rabbit, cotton wool, a Santa Claus mask with a beard, etc. After two months, the child was placed on a rug in the middle of the room and allowed to play with the rat.

At first, the child was not at all afraid of the rat and calmly played with it. After a while, Watson began to strike with an iron hammer on a metal plate behind the child's back every time Albert touched the rat. After repeated blows, Albert began to avoid contact with the rat. A week later, the experiment was repeated - this time the strip was hit five times, simply by placing the rat in the cradle. The baby cried already only at the sight of a white rat.

After another five days, Watson decided to test whether the child would be afraid of similar objects. The child was afraid of the white rabbit, cotton wool, Santa Claus mask. Since the scientist did not make loud noises when showing objects, Watson concluded that fear reactions were transferred.

Watson suggested that many of the fears, dislikes, and anxiety states of adults are formed in early childhood. Unfortunately, Watson did not succeed in ridding baby Albert of his causeless fear, which was fixed for the rest of his life.

Learned helplessness

In 1966, psychologists Mark Seligman and Steve Mayer conducted a series of experiments on dogs. Animals were placed in cages, previously divided into three groups.

The control group was released after some time without causing any harm, the second group of animals were subjected to repeated shocks that could be stopped by pressing a lever from the inside, and the animals of their third group were subjected to sudden shocks that could not be prevented in any way. As a result, dogs have developed what is known as “acquired helplessness,” a reaction to unpleasant stimuli based on the belief that they are helpless in the face of the outside world.

Soon, the animals began to show signs of clinical depression. After some time, the dogs from the third group were released from their cages and placed in open enclosures from which it was easy to escape. The dogs were again subjected to electric current, but none of them even thought about running away. Instead, they reacted passively to pain, accepting it as inevitable.

The dogs had learned from previous negative experiences that escape was impossible and made no further attempts to escape from the cage. Scientists have suggested that the human response to stress is much like a dog's: people become helpless after several failures, one after another. It is only unclear whether such a banal conclusion was worth the suffering of the unfortunate animals.

Milgram experiment

A 1974 experiment by Stanley Milgram of Yale University is described by the author in Submission to Authority: An Experimental Study. The experiment involved an experimenter, a subject, and an actor who played the role of another subject. At the beginning of the experiment, the roles of “teacher” and “student” were distributed between the subject and the actor “by lot”.

In reality, the subject was always given the role of "teacher" and the hired actor was always the "student." Before the start of the experiment, the “teacher” was explained that the purpose of the experiment was supposedly to reveal new methods of memorizing information. In reality, the experimenter investigates the behavior of a person who receives instructions that are at odds with his internal behavioral norms from an authoritative source. The “apprentice” was tied to a chair to which a stun gun was attached. Both the “student” and the “teacher” received a “demonstration” electric shock of 45 volts.

Then the “teacher” went into another room and had to give the “student” simple memory tasks over the speakerphone. For each student error, the subject had to press a button, and the student received a 45-volt electric shock. In reality, the actor who played the student was only pretending to receive electric shocks. Then, after each mistake, the teacher had to increase the voltage by 15 volts. At some point, the actor began to demand to stop the experiment. The “teacher” began to doubt, and the experimenter replied: “The experiment requires you to continue. Please continue."

As the tension increased, the actor acted out more and more severe discomfort, then severe pain, and finally broke into a scream. The experiment continued up to a voltage of 450 volts. If the "teacher" hesitated, the experimenter assured him that he took full responsibility for the experiment and for the safety of the "student", and that the experiment should be continued.

The results were shocking: 65% of the “teachers” gave a shock of 450 volts, knowing that the “student” was in terrible pain. Contrary to all the preliminary forecasts of the experimenters, most of the subjects obeyed the instructions of the scientist who led the experiment and punished the “student” with electric shock, and in a series of experiments out of forty subjects, not one stopped at a level of 300 volts, five refused to obey only after this level, and 26 “teachers” from 40 reached the end of the scale. Critics said that the subjects were hypnotized by the authority of Yale University. In response to this criticism, Milgram repeated the experiment, renting a shabby building in the town of Bridgeport, Connecticut, under the sign of the Bridgeport Research Association.

The results did not change qualitatively: 48% of the subjects agreed to reach the end of the scale. In 2002, the summary results of all similar experiments showed that from 61% to 66% of “teachers” reach the end of the scale, regardless of the time and place of the experiment. The most frightening conclusions followed from the experiment: the unknown dark side of human nature tends not only to mindlessly obey authority and carry out the most unthinkable instructions, but also to justify its own behavior by the received “order”.

Many participants in the experiment experienced a sense of superiority over the “student” and, by pressing the button, were sure that the “student” who answered the question incorrectly was getting what he deserved. Ultimately, the results of the experiment showed that the need to obey authorities is so deeply rooted in our minds that the subjects continued to follow instructions, despite moral suffering and strong internal conflict.

"Source of Despair"

Harry Harlow conducted his cruel experiments on monkeys. In 1960, while investigating the issue of social isolation of the individual and methods of protection against it, Harlow took a baby monkey from its mother and placed it in a cage all alone, and chose those cubs that had the strongest connection with the mother. The monkey was kept in a cage for a year, after which it was released. Most individuals showed various mental abnormalities. The scientist made the following conclusions: even a happy childhood is not a defense against depression. The results, to put it mildly, are not impressive: a similar conclusion could be drawn without conducting cruel experiments on animals. However, the animal rights movement began after the publication of the results of this experiment.

The boy who was raised like a girl

In 1965, an eight-month-old baby, Bruce Reimer, born in Winnipeg, Canada, was circumcised on the advice of doctors. However, due to a mistake by the surgeon who performed the operation, the boy's penis was completely damaged.

Psychologist John Money from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore (USA), to whom the parents of the child turned for advice, advised them on a “simple” way out of a difficult situation: to change the sex of the child and raise him as a girl until he grew up and began to experience complexes about his male incompetence. No sooner said than done: soon Bruce became Brenda. The unfortunate parents had no idea that their child was the victim of a cruel experiment: John Money had long been looking for an opportunity to prove that gender is due not to nature, but to upbringing, and Bruce became the ideal object of observation. The boy's testicles were removed, and then for several years Mani published reports in scientific journals about the "successful" development of his experimental subject. “It is quite clear that the child behaves like an active little girl and her behavior is strikingly different from the boyish behavior of her twin brother,” the scientist assured.

However, both home and teachers at school noted typical boyish behavior and biased perception in the child. Worst of all, the parents, who hid the truth from their son-daughter, experienced extreme emotional stress. As a result, the mother was observed to have suicidal tendencies, the father became an alcoholic, and the twin brother was constantly depressed. When Bruce-Brenda reached adolescence, he was given estrogen to stimulate breast growth, and then Mani began to insist on a new operation, during which Brenda was to form female genital organs. But then Bruce-Brenda rebelled. He flatly refused to do the operation and stopped coming to see Mani. Three suicide attempts followed one after the other.

The last of these ended in a coma for him, but he recovered and began the struggle to return to a normal existence - as a man. He changed his name to David, cut his hair and started wearing men's clothes. In 1997, he went through a series of reconstructive surgeries to restore physical signs of sex. He also married a woman and adopted her three children. However, the happy ending did not work out: in May 2004, after breaking up with his wife, David Reimer committed suicide at the age of 38.

• Russian pretty girl soldier in an attractive uniform
• Inductive method, its description and application features
• Functions and basic elements of the human nervous system General plan of the structure and significance of the nervous system
• Battle of Grunwald. Battle of Grunwald. History and significance Decisive battle with Grunwald
• The history of the development of science "Microbiology
• The cytoplasm of a bacterial cell
• Nomenclature of complex compounds
• Towers and stone suns of Freestyle Accident
• Architectural bureau SPEECH: close-up Project bureau SPEECH
• The best shots from the archive of the TASS agency Chronicles of TASS

• The beginning of the publication of the TASS photo archive in the public domain and the ap video collection on youtube TASS Photo Library
• Ways of personal self-development People engaged in self-development
• Visual support methods
• Rasputin Grigory Efimovich biography
• The heroic battle of the Pskov brigade of the GRU special forces (24 photos)
• Fgos preschool education IV
• Methods of analysis in analytical chemistry (chemical, physical and physico-chemical)
• Estonia and the Baltic countries: were they part of the USSR and what are the consequences of this stay?
• Unknown history of Russia: "Battle of Molodi
• Battle of Molodi: a repeat of the Kulikovo victory