Skip to main content
Loading Explore guides…
Robbers Cave Experiment · Acedra
Home
Explore
Psychology
Robbers Cave Experiment
Sign in to save
Chat
If YouTube asks you to sign in, open the video on YouTube.
Watch on YouTube
Reload player
Transcript
87 segments
Copy
Hide video
0:00
The Robbers Cave Experiment. Introduction 11 white, 11-year-old boys were sent to a special remote summer camp in Oklahoma, Robbers Cave State Park in the summer of 1954.
0:12
Each child is unknown to one another but they all have a few common background traits, their ethnicity, religion and 2 parent upbringing.
0:22
They have been told that they will be living together on this scout camp site, but first they must all get to know each other and pick a group name.
0:31
To solidify the bond between the boys a number of regular summer camp activities are undertaken such as swimming, hiking and playing games.
0:40
The boys pick the name The Eagles and stencil this onto white flags. What the children didn't know was that an almost identical story was playing out with another group of 11 -12 year old boys, across the park, and they had given themselves the name the Ratters.
1:00
Neither group is aware of each other and they are also unaware that in just a few days time they will be competing against each other in a number of standard summer camp activities. What the children also don’t know is that their camp counselors are actually researchers into a psychology experiment into intergroup conflict. And the researchers had created these two groups by randomly selecting and balancing attributes of the 22 boys.
1:29
The results of the study would reveal the tribal mentality which has allowed us to thrive as a species but also has been responsible for some true horrors.
1:41
Even though both groups shared so many background similarities the experiment would be described as the real life lord of the flies. Welcome to the dark side of science. ////// A little Background Our story starts not in the USA but in the Ottoman Empire with the birth of Muzafer Sherif on July 29, 1906. Sherif in the first 20 years of his life would see a tumultuous time for his home He grew up in Odemis located 113 km southeast
2:21
of the city of İzmir in roughly the west of modern day turkey. His family were wealthy and he was 1 of 5 siblings. Izmir would see occupation during the Turkish war for independence which ran between 1918 and 1923. Sherif would go to college during this period graduating in 1926 with a Bachelor of Arts From Izmir International College. His education would continue with him earning a MA from Istanbul University in 1928.
2:51
After discovering the works of William McDougall he looked into the theory of instinct and social psychology. As a surprise probably to no one McDougall was also into eugenics…. It does seem like everyone was into the theory in the early 20th century. Anyway I digress …..sherif would enroll at Harvard in the late 1920s gaining an MA. He would re-enroll in 1933 after a visit to Germany although he would change to Columbia for his doctorate earning his phd in 1935.
3:25
Upon returning to Turkey, sheriff was offered a position teaching at Ankara university. During his time at the university he was very open about his anti fascist views, at the time with Germany falling under the spell of naziism sherif was highly critical of hitler and became a communist ideological supporter. This would get him in trouble during the mid 1940s when in 1944 he was detained along with a number of Turkish communist party members.
3:55
Turkey during WW2 was a neutral power for the most part untill it sided with the allies in February 1945, but the country was fearful of a soviet invasion and sought to secure itself with the western allies.
4:10
This was around the same time that sherif decided to leave Turkey and return to the USA after being detained… in fear of a harsher punishment for his political activities as the country looked further west in its political alignment.
4:25
Sherif a graduate from 2 us universities found his Marxist views in the late 1940s a Benefit to his career as the social academic environment was more left leaning at the time. This led to his book The Psychology of Ego Involvements (1947), published from Princeton University. But being left leaning wasn’t to be a benefit for too much longer as the dark shadow of the Cold War loomed and the rise of McCarthyism. By the beginning of the 1950s sheriffs social,
4:59
political and professional ties to turkey fell apart during the anti communist movement. To add further insult to injury Ankara university officially fired him citing his marriage to a US citizen.
5:13
Oh yes I nearly forgot to talk about Carolyn, his wife. The couple met in 1945 when Carolyn who at the time was a research assistant at Princeton University under Muzafer sherif. She had gained a masters degree in 1944 whilst studying under Wendell Johnson of monster study fame. Their professional relationship developed into a personal then romantic culminating in their marriage in December 1945.
5:41
The two would go on to produce multiple works in the psychology and social psychological fields. Because of his communist ideology in the 1950s sherif was placed on an FBI watch list. Ok well that was a little bit of background to experimenters let’s look at the experiment. Starting in 1949 the sheriffs began to look at the field of social ingroups. Let me dust off my dictionary for the official definition
6:01
An in group is a small group of people in an organization or a society whose members share the same interests, language, etc. and try to keep other people out. The sheriffs sought to artificially create ingroups amongst boys and to see if they could turn these groups against one another to study inter group conflict. The first experiment would take place in the summer of 1949 with 24 white 12 year
6:27
old boys from lower middle class Protestant backgrounds, at an isolated Camp Middle Grove.
6:34
It would be funded by Yale university and the department for scientific research of the American Jewish community.
6:42
The reason for all the children having the same background was to eliminate differences apart from personality between the boys. Sheriff would for the experiment disguise himself as Mr Musee’ the camp caretaker, as a way for him to observe the behavior of his subjects.
7:00
The experiment would be formed of 3 stages, the first consisted of all the boys taking part in activities amongst each other and were allowed to form friendships. After a while the 24 boys were divided into two groups, the experimenters deliberately separated the budding friendships in their selection of each cohort of 12 children. From then on stage 2 commenced where each group would only be allowed to interact within each other, this was to try and establish an ingroup mentality.
7:32
Team building games were conducted where a common goal appealed to all in the group. By the end of this stage sherif noted that friendships were bonding within the individual groups and a hierarchical structure had formed. They found that the boys preferred interacting with their own ingroup over the other. Although this seems like a clean cut hypothesis confirmation it wasn't so perfect but we will discuss this later.
7:55
Now with the 2 groups stage 3 would involve adversarial competition. It was observed that the two groups would act hostile to one another, and although acting democratically internally in their 12 strong teams the boys didn’t conduct themselves accordingly with the out group. Sherif tried to restore harmony at the end of the study by giving the boys a “common enemy” to unite against. They did this by beating a softball team from outside the camp.
8:21
Although tensions still existed between the two groups. With these promising results the sheriffs sought out to expand upon the subject of ingroups. This brings us onto the 1953 sheriffs next experiment into ingroup behavior.
8:38
The study would follow the same lines as the 1949 experiment but would employ greater laboratory controls. But it would only get to stage 2 before being terminated early…. sheriff would later say in his 1961 robbers cave book on the reason for the failed experiment “owing to various difficulties and unfavorable conditions, including errors of judgment in the direction of the experiment,”
9:03
*But sheriff's seemly dismissive comment on the study actually glosses over the real reason but that will be revealed later*
9:11
This meant that a re-run was in order and with the remaining grant money burning a hole in Sherifs pocket this finally brings us onto the robbers cave study of 1954. /////// Finding 22 Children The re-run was planned to take place beginning in June for 3 weeks of the summer of 1954. The experiment would have 22 boys all from a similar background but vitally to not have ever had any previous interactions with one another,
9:41
but where to get so many children… it's not like you can just go and take a class from a school, as there would be prejudices in groups, micro cultures and inevitable rivalries. All of this could muddy the experiment. In order to find the group a large enough city had to be selected to find the pool of subjects, the experimenters settled on Oklahoma, sherif decided that a maximum of 1 boy per school could be selected.
10:09
Researchers were dispatched throughout the city to its many schools, and armed with higher education credentials and a letter managed to gain permission from the principals to go into the school yard to observe 5th grader boys playing. These credentials also gained access for the researchers to the children's school records… This compared to the modern world of stranger danger really blows my mind, oh the 50’s where a degree and a letter will get you in anywhere.
10:39
In total around 200 children were selected, this would require a little more selection down to around 50 children, who would have their parents contacted Any way to cut a long story short, around 5 or 6 children per school were selected, rated top to bottom in preference and their parents were contacted in the same order. The parents were given the same explanation of the study as the principles,
11:00
that the sherif team was looking to study the interaction of group activities within teams, and how they would act during sporting activities and their attitudes to winning or losing. The parents were explicitly told that visiting their child during the 3 weeks was prohibited, and the camp would cost 25$. Which apparently on the inflation calculator is 261.29 in 2022 money. Eventually the 22 participants were selected and thus the experiment could begin.
11:31
The overall concept of the experiment would be copied from the 1949 and 1953 studies, but would take a 3 stage form. Sherif named these Stage One Ingroup Formation: This would take the space of a week, where the two groups were kept separate, and team building exercises were undertaken to form an in group bond within the participants. Games and treasure hunts were planned during stage 1 to help build friendships and ingroup alliances. Stage 2 wouldbe the conflict or friction phase.
12:04
This would involve a tournament between the two groups. Consisting of sports like baseball, tug-of-war and a scavenger hunt but also experimental tests, like a bean-counting competition. A trophy was promised for the winners of the competition as well as prizes like knives and medals. Oh the 1950s when preteens were given weapons.
12:28
The third and final stage was the integration phase where the two groups would be brought together to undertake group tasks and leisure activities of watching films. To record their findings, hidden microphones were used throughout the two groups living area, which were used to record conversations to observe the camaraderie within the group. The groups were also given questionnaires to fill out about their group and later about the other outgroup.
12:52
The Robbers Cave “Real Life Lord of The Flies?” On the 19th of June a coach of 12 children arrived at the robbers cave state park in oklahoma.
13:05
A day Later another Group of 12 would also arrive at the camp, both groups were unaware of the other, and throughout stage 1 the experimenters would keep this the case by carefully managing the two’s activities throughout the park. The boys would stay in log cabins alongside the Moccasin Creek, where they could swim, play, and explore among the nearby woods. Each group had junior camp counselors who were university students, they would stay
13:33
with the boys all the time and there were senior camp counselors who were participant observers who stayed with the boys for 12 hours a day. Sheriff had instructed these assistants strictly to not influence the study in any way. Although there were two groups their experience in the first few days was very similar. After the 19th of June the First stage would begin, the formation of the ingroups, this began even on the coach ride to the camp, where the boys in their separate coaches
14:03
discussed parents and parts of the city of Oklahoma they had come from. Games were played and the groups were encouraged to create team names, make flags and create a motto, one group took the name the eagles, where the other took the rattlers. Once at the campsite the boys were given the opportunity to pick their bunk beds, over the next few days both groups were allowed to create hideouts and using a canoe placed near each respective campsite created their respective holdouts.
14:28
In order to keep both groups separate, meal times and activities were staggered, for the first week conversations were recorded and the participant observers took notes during each 12 hour observation period. Groups were allowed to purchase T-shirts and baseball caps for stenciling their respective group names on, as well as White sheets to be turned into flags. The type of language within the group addressed items as our things
14:46
and a noticeable micro culture was developing within the boys. One group Picked the name the eagles and the other the Rattlers. Towards the end of the first week the two groups were allowed to find each other and once completely confirmed by the camp workers that there was indeed another group both in groups became eager to see one another.
15:01
But a slight spanner was thrown in the works….. 2 boys in the eagle group had to be sent home due to homesickness. This would give an organic path to stage two the friction stage, but the experimenters found that both groups became insistent on challenging one another to a baseball game, allowing the subjects to believe that the tournament in stage 2 was their idea. The continued insistence of the groups albeit mainly from the rattlers
15:29
meant setting up the controlled circumstances for stage 2 became increasingly difficult. The Rattlers upon hearing the other group was playing on the baseball field, the group began to use language like, ‘They are using our diamond or they are on our field’ And referring to the other group as “Those boys at the end of the field” This showed that the in and out group dynamics had been successfully formed at least in the Rattlers.
15:50
And thus the experiment moved into Stage 2 or the friction Phase.
15:59
The first day of the friction phase consisted of an informal discussion between the experimenters, posing as staff and the two groups separately. These discussions informed the children of the tournament's possible prizes and assured them that every effort was being made to set everything up for the two groups to face off. Curically during this first day of stage 2 both groups had physical or visual contact with one another.
16:23
The different groups had different reactions to the informal announcements, the Rattlers seemed to be really excited for the competition and showed aggressive language about the other group. They appropriated the ball ground as theirs and planted a rattler flag, and made aggressive remarks about any would be flag removers. The Eagles on the other hand were less enthusiastic, with only a couple of the boys sounding particularly eager to face off.
16:49
For the remainder of the day the two groups prepared and practiced, the eagles were showing as the day progressed a greater group pride, when their flag was attached to a pole. On the second day the two groups would have their first close quarters contact, almost immediately this broke into name calling and aggressive behavior.
17:08
The two groups had breakfast at different times where they were introduced to the tournament exhibit which took the form of a trophy bladed knives and medals. After breakfast the tournament was officially announced. The groups were informed that each game would accrue points to the winning team and the team with the largest number of cumulative points would win the tournament. There was a mix of competitive activities as well as activities to be completed
17:34
separately by the groups which would be judged by the staff. The games were to consist of baseball and tug of war on the 1st and 2nd day of the competition touch football tent pitching and baseball on the 3rd day, and finally on the 4th day tug of war and tent pitching. The separately completed activities were cabin inspection on the 2nd day as well as skits and songs, day 3 had another cabin inspection, and day 4 had another cabin inspection and a treasure hunt.
18:04
The second group of activities allowed the experimenters to even out the score to keep the teams neck and neck for longer thus increasing the friction between the groups. Straight off the bat dont excuse the pun the rattlers won the baseball game and the tug of war, this was evened out by the experimenters during the cabin inspections. After the first 2 days of the tournament, the cheers for the losers and good sportsmanship went out the window, degenerating into heckling.
18:32
During meal times, insults were thrown at each other, and intergroup relations degenerated.
18:38
After the first tug of war the defeated eagles, took the ratters flag from the baseball pitch and set it alight. The next day the Rattlers were sent for breakfast first in order to see the charred remains of their flag. In retaliation a punch up between the two groups ensued and in the scuffle a member of the rattlers grabbed and burned the eagle flag. The next tug of war on the 2nd day resulted in a strong win for the eagles,
19:05
frustrated in this and fueled with the anger of the flag burning, the rattlers set about planning a raid of their adversaries camp. In the night around 10:30pm the rattlers group hit the eagles cabin, turning beds and ripping window screens, stealing comic books and clothing. The next day during lunch the eagles hit the rattlers cabin doing the same amount of damage. The rattlers by now had also replaced their brunt flag with a stolen pair of trousers,
19:34
much to the annoyance of the eagles. The competitions continued and were manipulated to such a way that by the last day of the competitions it was neck and neck and pivoted on the final task, the treasure hunt.
19:48
Because the hunt was separate between the two groups again this result could be manipulated, in the favor of the smaller eagles group. Right at the end of the hunt, both teams were brought out in front of the trophy and prizes and the winners were the eagles. The eagles did the hunt in 8 minutes 38 seconds and the rattlers 10 minutes 15 seconds. The Difference was night and day between the groups reactions, the eagles, gleeful in the win
20:16
shouting and jumping juxtaposed to the Rattlers dejected sitting watching the winners celebrate. The eagles went off to the creek to swim and play in victory. This must have grated on the defeated group, and they planned to even the score. The rattlers again raided the eagles camp and in doing so stole the knives and medals which had been won. Upon finding out the eagles squared off against the rattlers and a fight looked like it was about to break out.
20:45
A couple of the boys scuffled, but quickly enough this was broken up by the staff, the rattlers observers herded the group up the path back to their camp. A staff member returned some of the prizes to the eagles, but it was clear that neither group wanted to have anything to do with the other.
21:02
And thus The experiment now moved into its final stage integration.
21:12
Sherif and his team had created two groups who had become arch enemies, this hatreated was not from racial religious or cultural backgrounds, but purely from being arbitrarily selected into each group by a 3rd party and taking part in a cultivated and manipulated situation of stage 1 and 2. Initially it was thought that just exposure of the two groups to one another would increase the positive feelings between the two, sherif tried group meals
21:33
and watching movies in the recreation hall. During these scenarios the staff quite obviously would leave the groups and interact with one another. During the initial contacts seating was freely available thus giving the opportunity for the groups to intermingle, and before each meal or film the groups were made to wait near each other, but almost all interactions devolved into arguments and insults. During a lunch time, unsurprisingly both groups had chosen seats with one another,
22:01
and again it devolved into insults, and even a food fight. In order to bring the groups together sheriff decided that stage 3 would include introducing a common goal.
22:13
The experimenters engineered a fault with the water system, this was done by turning off the tap from the camps water tank and covering over the area with two boulders. It was hoped that the perceived deprivation of water would bring both groups together, they were told that vandals had done this before in order to absolve any blame from either group or the staff, and were told that 25 people were needed to find the issue and fix it. Thus requiring at least both teams to cooperate.
22:42
After the combined effort of both groups fixed the water issue, many of the boys went off to catch lizards play and carve wood whistles, but interestingly the children weren't working within there in groups but had separated off intermingling. But the intergroup friction continued to persist when the groups were separated for dinner leading to more insults and arguing. Another engineered cooperation task was securing the film treasure island,
23:09
the children were told that the camp couldn't afford the 15$ for the movie. As most of the children wanted to see the film, it was suggested that both groups could contribute,
23:19
after some initial hostilities of saying either group should pay the full amount, eventually a mutually acceptable amount was agreed where both groups paid an equal amount of $3.50 and the staff paid the rest. Although the 3.50 was not individually equal as the eagles only had 10 members, the breaking down of intergroup hostility showed some progress. During the negotiations the boys intermingled again by playing and talking.
23:46
The next day the two groups agreed to take turns in going first for lunch and dinner. Towards the end of stage 3 a campout was planned at cedar lake which would involve a truck ride including both groups. Once at the lake there was an engineered issue with the truck requiring all the boys to take part in a tug of war not against themselves but instead against the stricken vehicle. After several attempts of pulling the vehicle the truck restarted
24:14
and both groups erupted into jubilant celebration across group lines. The next day a trip to Arkansa was announced, this unlike before was seen as agreeable by both parties for the other to come along. For the final dinner back at the robbers cave site, the experimenters mixed around the seating from before as to encourage more inter mingling. Both groups as they had done before lined up but interestingly
24:39
after collecting their food all of the boys sat together across group boundaries. During the evenings discussion the idea posited that they all travel back home on the same bus, although a couple dissenting opinions were voiced the majority seemed to look forward to the proposition of all traveling together. Even on the journey home and a stop for refreshments, the rattlers agreed that a 5$ prize they had won be spent on drinks for everyone regardless of Group. Sherif’s Conclusion.
25:12
It seemed as if sheriff's hypothesis was correct, in that he could create two groups from almost identical backgrounds to hate each other. The experiment also showed that within the groups a hericary was formed with high and low status individuals, all without the encouragement of the adults. It was also discovered that ingroup stability increased when put into a competitive situation with an out group, and out group hostility also increased.
25:40
He also discovered that just exposing the two groups without competition during stage 3 didn’t reduce hostility, and as such group goals needed to be enacted to try and improve intergroup relations.
25:53
The ultimate result was although intergroup friction is increased when competition is included…. it can be reduced, thus meaning in the wider world intergroup relations can be improved. At the end of stage 2 sherif found that intergroup friendships were around 93% but by the end of the third stage this had dropped to around 75%
26:16
meaning that boundaries had been blurred by the use of superordinate goals. The study has been used as a practical example of Realistic conflict theory, where intergroup hostility can arise as a result of competition over limited resources; it doesn't matter however if it's real or perceived.
26:36
This theory has many extensions to explaining racisim xenophobia and in general our human desire for tribalisim, or the exclusion of the other, take football or soccer if your american games for example. People from essentially very similar backgrounds shout hatred and abuse to one another in the stands just because two teams are playing against one another on the pitch. The spectators probably have more in common with one another
27:03
than the millionaire sportsmen they are cheering on.
27:07
Criticism But what of the criticism, well there is a long list of both moral and scientific issues here. Morally the use of children who by design were not aware of the experiment couldn't give informed consent, and their parents and teachers as well were not given the full concept of what the boys were going to be involved in. This however does play into the Sherifs stated reliability of the experiment's results.
27:33
But the scientific validity of the study has been criticized, this is due to the odd vibes during the experiment, where staff members did not exactly act like they were actually staff. Instead of breaking up fights, they took photos, instead of telling off poor behavior they took notes. This was clearly not subtle as the reason for the 1953 study ending was likely due to the fact the children kept on asking why there were microphones hanging in their camp,
28:04
and the ultimate discovery of a notebook with observations of the children written in. The children instead of forming into two groups actually rallied against the experimenters, thus scuppering the sheriff's theory. In the Robbers Cave experiment,
28:19
the assertion of Sherif that the adults had no influence over the children is clearly wrong, as Stage 2 was manipulated to increase the tension between the groups. Even one of the group names, the Rattlers, was influenced by the boys witnessing one of the adults shooting a snake. The fact that the staff did not act like normal camp workers could have played up the reactions of the boys to be more aggressive.
28:43
Also that there was no control group also brings up issues of experiment result validity.
28:49
How can we know for certain if the groups would become hostile, have food fights and shout abuse at each other at a normal camp where the staff wouldn't intervene and stop the bad behavior. Furthermore It could be normal for boys who started out as enemies to end up as friends after 3 weeks, regardless of the superordinate goals set out by the experimenters. Leading to sheriff placing more weight on the results and attributing the children's actions to his realistic conflict theory.
29:18
The Study would become a cornerstone of realistic conflict theory and put the Sheriffs into the hall of fame of experimental psychologists, but multiple modern re evaluations of the experiment have disputed this. In Gina Perrys book ‘The Lost Boys’ which during her research went through all the material from the experiment found that there was more backstage manipulation than originally thought. The way the robbers cave experiment book is written glosses over the manipulation
29:48
in its neutral language, as Gina pointed out.
29:51
What is interesting however is how the 1953 study actually proved the better nature of the children in that they stayed friends and turned against the experimenters.
30:03
Now where would you rate this experiment on my ethical scale? I'm going to say around a 7 due to the violence that broke out between the boys and the apparent lack of intervention as well as the lack of informed consent on the part of the subjects.
30:18
This video is a Plainly Difficult production. All videos on the channel are creative commons Attribution-ShareAlike. Plainly difficult videos are produced by me John,
30:27
in a sunny Southeastern corner of london, uk. Help the channel grow by liking commenting and subscribing! Check out my twitter for all sorts of photos and odd and sods, as well as hints on future videos! I've got patreon and youtube membership as well so if you fancy check them out!
30:44
All that's left to say is thank you for watching!. **In 1953 psychologist mustfa sherif took two groups of 11 11 year old boys to a remote summer camp. But what was he up to? Well sherif was looking to study the effects
Here to help you learn
Sign in to keep a private conversation with your course tutor.
Ask me anything about the material…
Sign in to chat