There was an interesting sharing yesterday by one my friends in facebook. The shared post was a slide showing the result of an experiment by scientists carried out on a group of monkeys. The outcome of the experiment is interesting and has significant importance to our social behavior, the reason why I would like to write here.
At first the scientists selected a group of 5 monkeys and put them in a cage. In the middle of the cage they placed a ladder. At the top of the ladder, they placed some bananas. Obviously, the monkeys will be tempted to eat the bananas. One of the monkeys climbed up the ladder and took the banana. Then the scientists splashed cold water on other four monkeys standing on the ground. Splashing of water was repeated whenever a monkey climbed and took the banana. The monkeys now realized that whenever a monkey climbs the ladder, the rest will be splashed with cold water, which they did not like. All the five monkeys one by one tried to climb to take the banana, but the one who try to climb would be punished by beating by other four monkeys.
As a next step, scientists replaced one of the monkeys with a new monkey. The new one’s mind was fresh and did not know about the cold water splashing. By seeing the banana he started climbing up. The other four got angry, pulled him down and beat him. Scientists did not splash the cold water, but the fresh one got beaten by others.
Scientists replaced the fourth monkey with a second fresh one. Now they had three old monkeys and two new monkeys. The second new one tried to climb up the ladder and he was beaten by other four, including the first new one joined later. Now the scientists replaced all the old monkeys one by one with new ones and ever time a monkey tried to climb to reach to the banana, he was beaten by other four on the ground. Surprisingly the scientists did not splash cold water, but the monkey who tried to climb to the ladder was beaten by others.All the monkeys were new and had no experience of cold water splashing.
At first the scientists selected a group of 5 monkeys and put them in a cage. In the middle of the cage they placed a ladder. At the top of the ladder, they placed some bananas. Obviously, the monkeys will be tempted to eat the bananas. One of the monkeys climbed up the ladder and took the banana. Then the scientists splashed cold water on other four monkeys standing on the ground. Splashing of water was repeated whenever a monkey climbed and took the banana. The monkeys now realized that whenever a monkey climbs the ladder, the rest will be splashed with cold water, which they did not like. All the five monkeys one by one tried to climb to take the banana, but the one who try to climb would be punished by beating by other four monkeys.
As a next step, scientists replaced one of the monkeys with a new monkey. The new one’s mind was fresh and did not know about the cold water splashing. By seeing the banana he started climbing up. The other four got angry, pulled him down and beat him. Scientists did not splash the cold water, but the fresh one got beaten by others.
Scientists replaced the fourth monkey with a second fresh one. Now they had three old monkeys and two new monkeys. The second new one tried to climb up the ladder and he was beaten by other four, including the first new one joined later. Now the scientists replaced all the old monkeys one by one with new ones and ever time a monkey tried to climb to reach to the banana, he was beaten by other four on the ground. Surprisingly the scientists did not splash cold water, but the monkey who tried to climb to the ladder was beaten by others.All the monkeys were new and had no experience of cold water splashing.
The experiment suggest to the effects of conditioning and crowd behavior. Mostly people don’t know why they do what they do! They just do because their parents have been doing the same. They believe in one thing because their parents believed on that thing. The experiment on monkeys is the answer to the question of why we do many things in our life. The same can be of help to answer many of our social behaviors as well.
People in a crowd just follow and do not think. The crowd can be programmed and can be directed to commit serious crimes. Many religious and political leaders had taken advantage of this crowd psychology to satisfy their insanity.
A crowd of ordinary people or trained military people act almost in the same pattern. The best examples are the atrocities and brutal sexual crimes during Second World War, the communal violence in South East Asian countries, and the genocides in Africa. Such crimes had happened at almost all parts of the world and done by all sections of the societies in one sense or other. Let it be a small example of derogatory use of words to discriminate a person of other community, the crowd follows like those monkeys. This reinforces the doubts that human beings could not travel much from their ancestors.
The positive effects of crowd programming (Not cloud programming!) can be visible in Japan. There is a general feeling of uniformity in Japan. This uniformity is visible in the daily life, the way salary-men go to the office, the dress they wear, the manners, school kids uniform and a number of other things such as their likes and dislikes, including the public opinion about foreigners. In one sense this group behavior is good for social life.
I guess this crowd programming starts as a zero-year old child. I remember an incidence that happened about 14 years ago. An Indian friend of mine took her 1 year old child for some vaccinations to a clinic near Tokyo. There were many other Japanese mothers with one-year old kids. She told me that her daughter was the only one picking up things in the clinic, crying loudly, snatching other kids' toys. Finally a nurse told my friend to manage her daughter. My friend was, of course, very angry. At the same time, she was amazed that not even one Japanese 1-year-old kid created any fuss or trouble at the clinic. My friend called those kids as robots in the making. I had completely forgotten about the story but this post of yours reminded me of it again.
ReplyDeleteSo monkey behaviour is extrapolated to humans ? And well-behaved kids are robots?
ReplyDeleteI hate it when scientist use animals for their own experimental invention....it's so heartless of them.
ReplyDelete