Text/Alex
How much does group pressure affect individuals?
Derren Brown , a famous British psychologist, recently conducted an experiment and found that an ordinary person may only need 72 minutes to reach a murderer .
The process of this experiment was also recorded in a film - "Derren Brown: The Push" (Derren Brown: The Push)
The purpose of Brown's experiment is to explore whether a person will be manipulated by social group pressure to kill . 29-year-old Chris is one of 4 ordinary people who were selected as the experimental mice.
He is the director of a printing and design company. He lives a prosperous life and has a successful career. He loves his work and his friends, a harmless boy.
The reason why they stood out among the more than 2,000 contestants who signed up for the experiment was mainly because of their strong social compliance.
In Darren's view, unconditional submission to authority has become a part of modern life. Authority can be a person, a group of people, or an ideology .
In other words, when others are right, individuals tend to follow suit.
People who are highly submissive in society are more likely to be influenced by others, groups, authorities and other outsiders, and the key to doing experiments that they do not expect is to manipulate them step by step through the pressure of a group of people, so that they follow everyone else's path. Buddy's opinion, push the other person off the roof. So, did Chris finally go with the flow? I'll sell first.
Let's first see how Chris stepped into the pit step by step; what effect did the pressure of the group have on him.
First of all, the behavior of groups makes individuals unknowingly begin to conform to the crowd.
During the casting interview, Brown found three actors as contestants and sat in the interview room ahead of time. He asked these three actors to stand up when they heard the bell.
The other 24 real interviewees were brought into the laboratory one by one, and the staff told them that they only needed to fill out the form, and they did not tell them about the bell.
The first interviewee who came in had been standing and filling out the form at first, but when he saw the people next to him stand up and sit down to the bell, he became a little suspicious, and soon followed them to repeat the same action.
Next, other interviewers do the same.
If there is a little doubt, it means that the submissiveness is not strong enough, out.
This arrangement, after all, is also designed to manipulate these interviewers.
In the end, the 4 interviewees who were most easily influenced by others were selected as subjects.
The hole has been dug.
Next, use the solemnity of authority to create pressure on the individual to obey.
In order to make the whole plan look more grand, Brown hired a group of actors to preside over the experiment, specially selected a luxuriously decorated high-end venue as the experimental location, and also found a group of powerful celebrities to serve as spokespersons.
Such as David Tennant, Watson Martin Freeman and so on.
One of the key authority figures is actor Tom .
In the experiment, he "played" a high-ranking charity project executive, approached Chris to cooperate, and said that he would develop an app to serve the large-scale charity project "Push" and raise funds online.
He also sincerely invited Chris to attend the project opening ceremony in the evening to meet more people.
Chris thought it was a good opportunity and quickly agreed to the appointment.
The fish began to take the bait.
He didn't know that, except himself, everyone else was working on this experiment.
Seeing that the ceremony was full of high-ranking celebrities, Tom also reminded Chris that there was an important client who would donate 5 million pounds directly.
In order to win these big customers, Chris has secretly decided to serve them well.
Let him lie, and he's happy - the staff said that the vegetarian food had a problem on the way and couldn't be served on time, and Tom suggested sticking the vegetarian chess piece directly on the meat food, repeating that no one would find out.
Although Chris was a little skeptical, he did. He didn't say a word when he saw the vegetarians eating.
This is also Brown's first step in digging a hole - getting Chris to obey the group, please the authority, and actively lie for the authority.
Psychologically, this kind of individual actively obeying the group is one of the functions of the group effect: the social facilitation effect .
In group activities, the behavior of members is carried out in a certain group atmosphere. Once the individual realizes that this atmosphere has a positive effect on himself, he will mobilize his enthusiasm and enthusiasm, and try his best to complete the task, so as to get the group's affirmation, Praise and respect.
If there is a boosting effect, of course there will be a weakening effect .
How can Chris feel vulnerable?
First, the staff made excuses and took away his mobile phone, making him unable to communicate with the outside world. The channels for obtaining external information are blocked, and individuals in a specific environment have only a single, one-way source of information, so they cannot judge the truth of the facts.
Second, the staff deliberately arranged for other people to put on suits and ties together, but did not inform Chris to wear formal clothes. Seeing that everyone was wearing suits and leather shoes, while he was wearing casual clothes, Chris already had a sense of inferiority in his eyes, and everyone was talking and laughing, talking about big business, he began to feel inferior.
When a person is in a weak position, he tends to follow the crowd, because following the crowd's practices will make people feel safe.
Chris, who felt inferior, almost forgot his role as a partner. He started to bring champagne and bags to Bernie, a big client , and he followed Bernie wherever he went. Bernie's bad jokes, he will also laugh with them.
At this point, Brown has successfully introduced Chris into the role, and Chris has become very obedient. And this process took less than 20 minutes. The real highlight begins now.
At this time, there are still 52 minutes before pushing the person downstairs. Bernie was dissatisfied with the price list of the auction, pretended to be very angry, and kept swearing at the event organizer. Chris, who was standing aside, was embarrassed and at a loss. When he found out that Bernie "died from a heart attack", he panicked and kept saying he had to call an ambulance.
There were only Bernie, Tom, and Chris at the scene, but Tom said that the person was already dead, so it would be better to hide him first and deal with the body after the opening ceremony.
Tom caught Chris's nice character, and throughout the process, he was always in a high position, always using an imperative tone to dominate the whole thing, without any taste of discussing with Chris at all.
Chris felt inappropriate in his heart, but don't forget that he is very submissive and will be influenced by the opinions of those around him unknowingly.
Especially this authoritative command tone made Chris lose the ability to distinguish right from wrong.
He followed Tom to carry the body into the conference room and hid it in the box. After listening to Tom's words, he pretended to be Bernie and performed on stage.
In this way, Chris, who is getting more and more nervous, has no ability to fight back, step by step into the abyss.
When Tom asked him to push the body out to the auction site and put it on the stairs to create the illusion of an accidental fall, Chris did not refuse;
When the body was discovered by two drunks, Chris didn't even need someone's instructions, so he started to lie about it;
When the whole thing was found to be an oolong, Bernie was not dead, but had a narcolepsy attack without taking medicine, and he didn't need anyone to direct him.
From the fake vegetarian little lie at the beginning, to the complete obedience of what others say he does, and finally to the initiative to admit all responsibility, whether in fact or psychologically, Chris has changed from a bystander to a part of this conspiracy.
Once you tell a lie, you have to tell countless more lies. But a lie can't round up another lie, it just keeps getting bigger and bigger, until it goes to the extreme.
At this time, it was only 7 minutes before the murder.
After Chris explained to several attendees, they continued to press Chris:
Bernie is a big client. He is awake now and will sue us! Only by getting rid of him can we protect our interests!
And you Chris, he will definitely settle accounts with you, your future is ruined like this, can you bear it?
Bernie next to him continued to rant, condemning Chris and Tom.
The billboard on the roof is also repeating the slogan of this charity project: Push it, no matter the cost.
These repetitive verbal brainwashing pushed Chris to the top of his stress. Either erupt in silence, or die in silence.
Chris has only two options: one is to sacrifice personal interests, push Bernie down, and protect the interests of the group;
The second is to firmly guard the bottom line, take the initiative to surrender, admit the mistakes you have made, and push things back.
In this experiment, not only Chris participated, but in two days, the same experiment was held 4 times.
The 4 selected guinea pigs, in the end, will face the same problem as Chris: to push or not to push .
In the end, 3 of the 4 people retreated tremblingly; only Chris, at the critical moment, chose not to push.
From ordinary people to murderers, it took them only 72 minutes.
Gustave Le Pen wrote in The Crowd:
As soon as people enter the group, their IQ is seriously reduced. In order to gain recognition, individuals are willing to abandon right and wrong, and exchange their IQ for that sense of belonging that makes people feel more secure.
In order to obtain this sense of security, individuals are often willing to sacrifice their own values, morals, and even the bottom line of human nature to work hard to integrate into the group.
It is safe to obey the group, but at the same time, this group nature is likely to become a dangerous behavior, especially when the more authoritative people in the group and the more just the values advocated, the easier it is for things to go to extremes.
From the little bit of evil at the beginning, to the constant obedience, to the irreversible sin, everything often becomes logical and irreversible.
MLM is like this, so is cult.
Brown hopes to use this experiment to remind everyone that as long as we put pressure on us, we will easily surrender our autonomy, and if we lose this self-control, we will often do things that we do not expect ourselves .
Are we only at the mercy of groups? No. Everyone can stick to the bottom line like Chris and push this pressure back. Don't follow the crowd easily, don't do evil easily.
(First published on the public account bookface, the article is slightly edited)
View more about Derren Brown: Pushed to the Edge reviews
