Books & Articles Strangers in Dark Rooms Together

[Chase]

Interesting contrast between these two studies, highlighted in the article "Deviance in the Dark." The premise was a bunch of male and female college students - complete strangers - placed in completely dark rooms together to see what would happen.

In 1973:

At first they talked, but then the conversation soon slacked off. Then the touching began. Almost 90% of subjects touched someone else on purpose. More than half hugged someone. A third ended up kissing. Almost 80% of the men and women reported feeling sexually excited. They also reported it was a bonding experience in terms of in-group feeling and several of the participants offered to come back as unpaid extras in the future (apparently there must have been a small financial incentive). The one thing that didn't happen was any animosity between them. No argy-bargy. It promoted good feelings.

In 2012:

Now the same experiment was performed by Ken and psychologist wife Mary for the cameras of Discovery Channel. This time participants locations could be detected by thermal imaging equipment. They entered one by one and the same slightly apprehensive conversations began:- " Hey I don't want to trip people over here." "Wow I thought this was a porno" etc. Then......nothing. After lying in more or less separate spaces for around 30 minutes, so everyone had enough room, there was one reported incident of touching, but only to say:- "Hey, feel the hole in my wrist. This was the result of an accident that happened when I got this tattoo." Pretty much zilch in terms of intimacy after and it came to an end some 60 mins later.

What's interesting to speculate about is, what's the difference? Has Western culture changed that much over 40 years (i.e., people have become much more intimacy-paranoid), or were there other factors that made each of these two studies different from one another - e.g., what people were told prior to entering the rooms, whether people saw each other first, what the rooms were like, how many people were together... etc.

Hard to get a read on what this one means because there are just too many things it could be.

Chase

 

[AsianPersuasion]

I always felt that people had more barriers up in my generation than the previous ones. Probably because with the rise of technology, people have lost the innate openness of previous generations.. On the bright side, looking open makes you look that much more different from everyone else in this society full of bubbles and barriers.

 

[Ryan]

Wow, i hope there was an unnaccounted variable that went amiss because what a miserable world we live in otherwise

 

[PinotNoir]

Did the 2012 group know that they would be televised?

I'd say that that's the main difference. If I knew this was going to be televised, I would probably be less touchy. However, if it was 1973 and my "reputation" wouldn't be permanently displayed on TV and youtube, then I'd definitely accidentally touch

I'd say that the rise of public permanent information (the internet) has made people more wary in public situations. If you do something seen as socially bad by the mainstream social media, then it will be blasted on twitter, facebook, youtube, etc. Even if you don't agree with the social norms, it still affects you.

It could also be constant internet interaction making us less social -- but I'd think the dark room would emulate this.

But, it could definitely be just more openness in the 70s compared to 2010s.

Lastly, as with any study, sample size is important. Maybe if this same study was done in LA or NYC, we'd get different results? I don't know what city they pulled people from, or was it just from all over? Were there differences in age between the 73 and 2012 study? Was everyone single in both studies?