Those conducing the experiment came in with a preconceived agenda which they wished to prove ie that conflict easily arises based on quite trivial group differences etc.
There had been two previous failed experiments in which attempts had been made to create the conflicts described in this study and involving in some cases quite blatant attempts to foment conflict (eg false flag attacks) (see at 12:15 in the audio).
In this third experiment conditions were artfully manipulated to create and then defuse conflict. It appears the key issue in creating conflict is that the two groups must not be permitted to get to know each other and become friendly, and that intense competitive situations are needed, preferably with zero or negative sum outcomes. To then defuse the conflict, allowing socialization no longer sufficed and it was necessary to create a common threat or difficulty to bring the groups together again.
So the statement in the main post that
Well, the 22 boys were divided into two groups of 11 campers, and—
—and that turned out to be quite sufficient.
Is perhaps overstated significantly.
It is a very interesting listen.
I don’t know if the claims are true. Given how ‘right’ the results of the original experiment feel, and did feel after WWII, one should be on guard.
Edit; corrections—the experiment was not rigged to quite the degree I originally said. But still I would argue not quite as advertised.
I know I’m very late to this thread, but I wanted to mention that this article also provides reasons to not place too much weight on Sherif’s results. (Although of course the broad inferences drawn from his results might happen to be true anyway.) In particular, the article suggests Sherif had attempted a similar study earlier (in another location, with other boys), did not find the results he wanted (despite manipulation), and then suppressed that attempt’s results:
Despite his pretence of leaving the 11-year-olds to their own devices, Sherif and his research staff, posing as camp counsellors and caretakers, interfered to engineer the result they wanted. He believed he could make the two groups, called the Pythons and the Panthers, sworn enemies via a series of well-timed “frustration exercises”. These included his assistants stealing items of clothing from the boys’ tents and cutting the rope that held up the Panthers’ homemade flag, in the hope they would blame the Pythons. One of the researchers crushed the Panthers’ tent, flung their suitcases into the bushes and broke a boy’s beloved ukulele. To Sherif’s dismay, however, the children just couldn’t be persuaded to hate each other.
After losing a tug-of-war, the Pythons declared that the Panthers were in fact the better team and deserved to win. The boys concluded that the missing clothes were the result of a mix-up at the laundry. And, after each of the Pythons swore on a Bible that they didn’t cut down the Panthers’ flag, any conflict “fizzled”. By the time of the incident with the suitcases and the ukulele, the boys had worked out that they were being manipulated. Instead of turning on each other, they helped put the tent back up and eyed their “camp counsellors” with suspicion. “Maybe you just wanted to see what our reactions would be,” one of them said.
That said, the article doesn’t seem to provide evidence of substantial manipulation during the Robbers Cave study itself. So perhaps the conclusion to draw from Sherif’s pair of studies is that, under such conditions, intense intergroup conflict will arise naturally roughly half the time.
Note that this article isn’t included in the latest edition of Rationality: AI to Zombies, for roughly the reasons listed here (if I remember correctly).
It appears the key issue in creating conflict is that the two groups must not be permitted to get to know each other and become friendly
Because then, of course, they might start attributing each other’s negative actions to environmental factors, instead of assuming them to be based on inherent evil.
Also worth noting in this context the great difficulty armies have in getting soldiers to actually kill the enemy. A lot of military training is aimed at desensitizing soldiers to the thought of killing the enemy.
In WWI informal truces kept breaking out along the front.
Here http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/hindsight/inside-robbers-cave/4515060 is a radio show on ABC radio Australia (roughly equivalent to the US PBS), casts a new light on the Robbers Cave experiment.
It is claimed that
Those conducing the experiment came in with a preconceived agenda which they wished to prove ie that conflict easily arises based on quite trivial group differences etc.
There had been two previous failed experiments in which attempts had been made to create the conflicts described in this study and involving in some cases quite blatant attempts to foment conflict (eg false flag attacks) (see at 12:15 in the audio).
In this third experiment conditions were artfully manipulated to create and then defuse conflict. It appears the key issue in creating conflict is that the two groups must not be permitted to get to know each other and become friendly, and that intense competitive situations are needed, preferably with zero or negative sum outcomes. To then defuse the conflict, allowing socialization no longer sufficed and it was necessary to create a common threat or difficulty to bring the groups together again.
So the statement in the main post that
Is perhaps overstated significantly.
It is a very interesting listen.
I don’t know if the claims are true. Given how ‘right’ the results of the original experiment feel, and did feel after WWII, one should be on guard.
Edit; corrections—the experiment was not rigged to quite the degree I originally said. But still I would argue not quite as advertised.
I know I’m very late to this thread, but I wanted to mention that this article also provides reasons to not place too much weight on Sherif’s results. (Although of course the broad inferences drawn from his results might happen to be true anyway.) In particular, the article suggests Sherif had attempted a similar study earlier (in another location, with other boys), did not find the results he wanted (despite manipulation), and then suppressed that attempt’s results:
That said, the article doesn’t seem to provide evidence of substantial manipulation during the Robbers Cave study itself. So perhaps the conclusion to draw from Sherif’s pair of studies is that, under such conditions, intense intergroup conflict will arise naturally roughly half the time.
Note that this article isn’t included in the latest edition of Rationality: AI to Zombies, for roughly the reasons listed here (if I remember correctly).
Because then, of course, they might start attributing each other’s negative actions to environmental factors, instead of assuming them to be based on inherent evil.
See eg 12:15 where the experimenters were frustrated at fratanization and took steps to fan conflict.
Also worth noting in this context the great difficulty armies have in getting soldiers to actually kill the enemy. A lot of military training is aimed at desensitizing soldiers to the thought of killing the enemy.
In WWI informal truces kept breaking out along the front.