Would you have enjoyed being in the Robbers Cave Experiment? Any suggestions for a future Dark Side of Science video? Let me know in the comments!

Very interesting that the children in the 1953 experiment correctly identified that the real outgroup was the researchers rather than the artificial outgroup of other children created by the researchers.

this is such a 90's kids' movie plot. Summer camp, secret scientists, rivalries, tasks, bullying, and a happy ending with a moral of the story

"When preteens were given weapons!" I was like 9 years old when I got my first pocket knife, in the 90s. Granted it had all of a 2" blade, but learning to use a small tool knife responsibly is something I think most children should learn.

My take: I might have been lied to, but if I had paid $260 and found out my son had actually outsmarted a bunch of University professors i would be very proud of him.

It warms my heart to think about a group of children realizing that they're the subjects of an experiment, and rallying against the researchers!

As someone who was at a summer camp as a child that immediately formed tribalistic conflict and devolved into violence because the only adult in the camp didnt keep an eye on us I feel like I've gone through a similar experience. It got to the point where a kid got rushed off to a hospital due to sharpened stick related injuries. Based on my anecdotal experience I doubt the researchers behavior was required to incite violence or that intergroup mending at the end.

Interesting that you consider the knives as prizes in a summer camp as "weapons". My mind immediately thought of them as fitting wilderness survival tools.

I have a feeling many fights with children were rarely stopped quickly. I’m from that neck of the woods. If a fight broke out there was an older voice saying “let them get it outta their system”. The elders felt that there was typically a lesson to be learned in a fight wether you win or lose. 1954 would’ve probably held that sentiment a lot more strongly than we do today.

“Arminian deportations” is a really nice way of saying Genocide…

The real life Lord of the Flies actually ended well. 6 boys who wrecked on a Pacific Island near Tonga actually helped each other survive for more than a year. They were also different races. This shows that such situations can actually end well (especially when they don't have researchers antagonizing them).

Honestly not that bad. You rated this a number higher than the *Stanford Prison Experiment!* The parents definitely should have been almost fully informed on what was going to happen, especially since they wouldn’t even be there, but no serious injuries occurred, and it seems like the kids even had a pretty good time. I would probably look back on it fondly if I took part of it.

It's extremely reassuring that if you show people/children who the real out-group is that manipulates others into situations like these, there is a chance they will unite to revolt against the true out-group.

Honestly, as a teacher, I think the 1953 experiment sounds downright funny. The researchers were so careless and the children were a lot more clever than they were given credit for. I'd love to hear a bit more out of it, but I suppose there isn't much information since it was canceled?

Aside from the lack of consent and other issues that can be justified in the context of an experiment, they actually made the parents pay for it. "We want to do a psychological study on your kid in the middle of nowhere for a few weeks. And no, you can't visit. So... will you be paying us by cash or check?"

I love the little pause he does when he tells you the weather where he lives. Like, it’s an audio cue where you can clearly tell he’s looking out the window to see what it’s like outside before continuing on with his outro.

I'm personally very suprised that you gave this a 7 out of 10. That's higher than the scores you gave in other videos where they tortured and killed animals. I would give this a 2 or 3. I probably wouldn't mind someone putting me through a similar test honestly.

Nice one 🍻 'Why are there microphones in our tents?' Also, children are good at noticing when adults are acting differently than usual. I feel like the researchers heavily underestimated the cognitive abilities of the young lads.

Let's just take a moment to appreciate that whether it was ethical or scientific or none of the above, these people took some kids out to the woods, got them to form gangs, and armed them.

John. I have just enjoyed your Robbers Cave Experiment video from a currently cold overcast and rainy part of Old Hickory Tennessee USA. Great job as always.

I just stumbled across your channel and want to say kudos to you. Also that those situations were still going on into the late 90's. I recall church camp being divided into groups and pitted against each other, along with bunk inspections, all with prize vouchers for commissary (junk food) all that from a group that says "Love fellow Man", "Turn thy other cheek!". Man is capitalized to mean mankind as a whole.

"But where to get so many children...?" Best mad scientist quote ever.

I am from the area around Robbers Cave, and as a kid, went to a conservative church summer camp there almost every year. It’s a beautiful area. Didn’t hear about the experiment until sociology class in college.

i’m an adult volunteer for a youth group and we have summer camp every year. the kids are well cared for and counselors and volunteers (who go through extensive background checks) are always keeping watch over the kids so no drama or safety issues occur. sportsmanship and kindness are heavily promoted and any trouble (bullying, stealing, fighting, etc.)that comes along is dealt with accordingly. in short, it’s a great and safe environment, but the kids still act this way when they are around another group ( the kids are split into groups) it’s human nature to be competitive

This is one where I think you cannot ignore the potential for influence and the lack of a control group absolutely skewing the results. I would love to see if modern researchers could even possibly sit down and with modern ethical and scientific guidelines create a useful comparable experiment because it seems that the "othering" behavior is so often taught and never just innate.

I'd give it a 4. While the kids may have been manipulated, the results are pretty typical of any normal summer camp or interscholastic sport.

If you really want to study "in groups," just be a teenage girl going through an all-girls high school. It only took a week or two for me to realize what groups I wasn't welcome in. And this was in the early 1990s. I can't imagine it has gotten any better over time.

This is awesome. I went to summer camp for 3 years and we were divided into groups and we became fiercely tribal. We all had different group songs and sat in separate areas during meals. Also, all the kids in my group formed sub groups depending on which city they were from. We sometimes cooperated to accomplish goals but soon after re-segregated back to our groups.

I live 20 miles from Robbers Cave now (I formerly lived in Wilburton where it's located as well) & have visited there many times but never heard this story. Thanks for making this video. Very interesting! 💌 Peace & Love from Oklahoma 💌

Let's all take a moment to appreciate how much work it takes to create a 30 minute mini documentary! Thank you John from Plainly Difficult!

The experiment kind of reminds me of army basic training, where instructors promote inter squad rivalry in order to get the best out of their squad, obviously intervention occurs to prevent things getting out of hand. I think the staff may have unknowingly influenced the children, it would be impossible for them to remain totally impartial. Thought provoking episode, my only criticism would be your description of the Armenian genocide as deportations, the word genocide was coined specifically to describe those atrocities.

I'm half convinced this whole study is happening on a worldwide scale.

I've been saving this video because I'm going to that group Camp, group Camp 2, at Robbers Cave State Park this weekend. I go there every year with friends. Never knew about this experiment before

I was expecting a more horrific outcome from the experiment, but at least am glad that it ended more peacefully than harmfully. I do wish that the least the information was given to them by the end, in an attempt to be truthful and mend any conflict, thus teaching a lesson about the dangers of tribalism and unreasonable hatred. This entire study was practically unnecessary given the natural instinct and situations that arise in school settings, and definitely would have been possible to witness naturally in the 50s.

'Armenian deportations' is a rather odd way to describe the massacres that happened to the Armenians en masse

Dude this seemed like an awesome time for the kids! I would of loved to go to that camp as a kid!

I’d really like to hear from actual participants of the experiment. I’d like to know their take off what happened. That would be really interesting to hear as well.

Plainly Difficult recommending a channel with no videos is just part of their inimitable zen style. ♡

Hi. It’s the Armenian Genocide. Not “deportations.” My great grandparents’ brothers, sisters, parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles were shot in the head and had their bodies dumped in a mass grave in Erzurum, not deported somewhere. I know it doesn’t seem like a big deal and isn’t even what the video is about, but it’s misinformation like this that is letting the Ottoman Empire get away with it. I’ve been a long time follower of your account and this just disappoints me.

If you tried this in 2023, half of the kids would slaughter the other half - and at least one staff member

I was a boyscout - even without an experiment, we could get pretty tribal. Each troop of scouts (your whole group from one source) was broken down into patrols of about a dozen boys each. The patrols regularly competed in events against each other, tended to form their own cliques, and occasionally harassed the other patrols in the troop. When multiple troops came together (for a jamboree, or large summer camp) it got worse. Whole troops would harass one another - tent and camp raids, etc. It was never bad enough to start fights, and the adults and counselors usually just considered it "boys being boys" and all having a bit of good fun. But if wouldn't have taken much. I remember at once large camp, we made small catapults to prove our lashing skills. They could lob tennis balls a bit more than 100 yards. And so of course, a few patrols from 2 troops got together, set up catapults, and in the middle of the night started raining tennis balls and then rocks into a site at the other end of the camp. That one did cop some disciplinary action, but even 14yo me could see the counselors trying not to laugh as they described how rude it is to be woken up by rocks raining from the sky onto your campsite.

I'd definitely rate this one MUCH lower on the ethics scale. Maybe a 4 at most. It wasn't an inherently dangerous experiment so the consent issue doesn't seem so big to me, and the fist fighting and general mischievousnous of the boys seems pretty on par for kids in the 1950s. Given this one took on the name "real life lord of the flies" I was half expecting one kid to end up in the ER

I grew up in Wilburton where Robbers cave is and have been camping there a ton both as a child in the Boy Scouts and as an adult with my children. It’s really interesting to find out about this happening in my own back yard. Good job.

Finally a happy ending in a plainly difficult video? no way!

One of the most interesting stories I’ve ever heard and I’m from Oklahoma, Been to Beautiful Robbers Cave, and was in the Boy Scouts until I made Eagle Scout.

Armenian genocide, not "deportations"

I found your channel about two weeks ago and I can't believe it took me so long. Your content style is pretty much all I watch so it legit boggles my mind that it took so long for UKposts to suggest your channel. I've been happily enjoying mini-binges ever since. I'm bummed that I will eventually catch up but I can't help it. I love that you actually research the topics and present them in your own words instead of regurgitating Wikipedia or some other source like a lot of channels do. This is one of the best channels on UKposts, period. Thank you for every video, good sir. Obviously I enjoy them thoroughly. Much respect from Colorado. 👍

Growing up in the area and going to Robber's Cave in Wilburton Regularly, I've always found this interesting it wasn't taught in school

Was this an experiment or a movie from the 90s? This should be made into a movie. It even includes food fights, bad adults to team up against, and most importantly, friendship.

this is eerily similar to what I experienced during last year of my life. My country (I'm from eastern Europe) has mandatory military service. I finished my 9 month service only 2 weeks ago, everything is still very fresh. When we were brought to basic training, our company consisted of 2 platoons, around 40 boys each, each platoon seperated into 3 sections. Rivalry between the platoons quickly developed. After 11 weeks of basic training, we got sent to a combat unit we were assigned to. We were divided between two smaller, specialized companies, the staff company and heavy weapons company I served in. The division was random, and it so happened, that I was now mostly with guys from the former "other" platoon. it was weird, also, the commanders were much, much stricter, and our life was turned into social hell for like 2 months, I believe this helped with coheasion of newly formed groups. Due to both companies knowing each other, there were a lot of communication between us, even tho rivalry somehow started between the companies, even tho there was a lot of seperated friends. After the service, we organized the party, it was mainly our former platoon of basic training, thus friends, but I was the only one who was sent to the other company. it was weird to say the least. The whole service felt like a huge compilation of experiments you host on this channel. we learned to live in fear, we learnt to hide, we learnt to adapt, overcome, and not to mind external stressors. Funnily enough, I developed couple of really good friends. Well, I guess out of tens of draftees from different backgrounds, you'll find some people you enjoy being with. Thankfully as a NATO member we didn't get involved in you know what, and we got demobilized when our time was up. I wish luck on the new boys. Thank you for the video and thank you for reading.

me before watching plainly difficult: science ain't that scary me after watching plainly difficult: mommy help me

10:05 As someone born and raised in Oklahoma, I just want to point out that Oklahoma is the state; Oklahoma City is the city. No one refers to the capital as just "Oklahoma." OKC and (with enough context) the City are acceptable shorthands for Oklahoma City. 14:11 In sufficient context, I suppose "city of Oklahoma" would point to OKC, but my gut feeling would still be to say something like "parts of Oklahoma City they had come from," "parts of the city of Oklahoma City they had come from," or "parts of the City they had come from." Also, OKC isn't the only city in the state. You could've just as easily been referring to Tulsa, among others. I hope I'm not being pedantic haha. Overall, great video! Crazy to think my aunt could've been classmates with one of the boys, as she would've 11 in 1954!

I've been to this place a few times(robbers cave)..its beautiful country thru there for sure!! It does get crazy busy there with campers on holidays,but it's really cool just being there surrounded by all the nature..

I guess you haven't heard, but the real life "Lord of the Flies" actually happened. A bunch of kids got stranded on an island. But guess what? They all worked together and thrived. That's what really happens when manipulative assholes don't interfere, be they scientists or politicians.

Its the Armenia Genocide not the "Armenian deportations" please stop the denial

I've been to robbers cave, it's like a hiking trail now. When I was there I was completely unaware of this story and we were told two criminals used the cave systems as their hideout. (might also be true it was along time ago and haven't do any research)

I love Robbers Cave! Been numerous times ❤

This experiment honestly doesn’t seem that bad. There was no heavy emotional damage, little kids fighting isn’t that uncommon even now, much less back then, kids steal things from each other and get overly competitive about silly things, and after it all the group all ended up friends anyway, there was no long term animosity. Whether the results were ultimately useful is another question, but I’d argue that the conclusions probably are still useful, though different from the conclusions of the original researchers, kind of like the results of the Stanford Prison Experiment Though Stanford didn’t really tell us that those in places of power will always devolve into violence if unchecked, it still shows that people can be convinced to do horrible things if they’re told it’s for a greater cause, such as the advancement of science And in the case of this experiment, I would say it’s still a good example of how groups that despise each other can come to like each other through simple contact

Calling this a "horror" is a pretty long stretch. This sounds like a typical summer camp experience.

I go to robbers cave all the time during the summer! It’s a great place to hike around

In the late 1970's I went on a 2-week camp outing with my 6th grade class, so I was about 10y/o. They did those 'cabin inspections' and they were playing games with it. We had to make our beds 'military style' which very few students knew what it was, and the counselors didn't show any of us. I was a military brat so I showed a few, then they showed a few etc... and in 3 nights everyone in the camp was making their beds 'perfect'. Counselors didn't like that though, so they kept telling our cabin that I failed to make my bed properly, trying to cause my mates to turn on me. Didn't work though 'cause everyone knew I was the teacher. Couple more days pass and they announce that *I* failed inspection again so no one in the camp gets dessert, this time trying to incite the entire camp against me. Unbeknownst to me, all the students (over 100) decided in advance to refuse to eat anything, called out the counselors on their lies and BS, and a couple of the rich students had phoned their parents. Those game-player counselors got fired and they had to bring in new for the 2nd week. We all had a great time after that.

I live in Oklahoma, and have been to the fall festival at robber’s cave dozens of times, yet i had never, ever heard of this experiment, this is just incredibly wild, and even more insane that I’ve been there several times, and may have stood where an individual from these groups could have stood.

The children rallying together against the sus experiment gives me actual hope for mankind.

I have always maintained that the worst thing that happens to children is adults ...

Why does this camp sound so fun though...like I did scouts as a child and we absolutely loved doing things like this on weeks away summer camping trips . We were always very competitive.

Imagine being able to convince somebody to pay YOU $260 to let their child be part of a science experiment!

I’m very curious at how violent the fights became. Hopefully none of the children received any severe injuries. I received an injury at summer camp that still causes me pain several decades later. It’s actually hurting right now. During “Capture the Flag”, I was one of the kids who agreed to protect our flag (guard). I caught two kids that were really close, and captured both of their socks. The boy grabbed my arm and kept twisting it slowly until it broke, even though I begged and pleaded for him to stop. The moment I saw that he wasn’t going to follow the rules, I was prepared to release the socks, but I wasn’t able to.

What really gets me is that I lived so close to this place all my life and have never known this

Great coverage. Id be interested in researching an ethical version of this ingroup/outgroup theory

Thanks for the lovely video presentation. I found it very interesting how different your life in Britain is from mine in America. I was born in Vegas in the 90's and given my first pocket knife at 6 for camping tool purposes. Later, I won my first rifle in a raffle at 12 where my younger brother won his. I hunted rabbits and birds from that age in the desert, and got my license to hunt Antelope, Deer, and Elk in the state at age 14. My younger cousins aged 7-12 in the past 4 years all have begun pistol and rifle shooting. Our whole extended family enjoy hunts every year. It's interesting that one of the criticisms was of staff at a camp killing a snake being abnormal. Animal control is important for the safety of people and shooting ends up being the best way to carry it out in camp settings. I also noticed you called the Armenian Genocide a 'deportation' and I wonder if that's how they taught it in your schools. Finally, I had to relisten when you were talking about which city the kids were selected from because you said 'Oklahoma' which is a state in our country. I assume you mean Oklahoma City which is the name of the city within that state. These kinds of different perspectives and acceptance of opposite norms prove to me that conflict is innate to us.

I went to school and that cured me of any great hope or respect for humanity irreparably by age 10.

Paused at 2 minutes (on the dot by luckey chance, I pressed pause and reaction to something he said and that's just where it happened to land)... I'm leaving this video with the intent to return after watching a couple of trailers and a short synopsis of Lord of the Flies, since I never seen it and I want to get the reference. The things I do to merely understand a reference.

What I would have added to this study was the reactions of the children seeing camp leaders disagreeing , even fighting among themselves . And the posable chaos that could erupt and the politics of it.

I really enjoy your videos and found this one very interesting, if not surprising, it's pretty much normal human nature. My only confusion is in the title, "The Horror of..." While perhaps unethical by modern standards (though not of the time necessarily), I'd hardly call this a horror. Since I wasn't familiar with this incident, I didn't already know how it ended. I kept expecting it to end in the same manner as the Lord of the Flies (since you refer to it also). I expected somehow it got out of control, and one or more of the boys was killed, or at least injured, or some horrific accident happened during one the activities. But it sounded like the worst thing that happened was what normal kids do, fights, name calling, cabin-raids, sabotage, etc. And since it sounded like they pretty much all made friends at the end (instead of killing each other), I think the "horror" description is just absurd. When you introduced the knives as prizes, I thought surely that's foreshadowing, and some boy is going to get knifed by the end. But of course, nothing happened worse than a food-fight. Still, an interesting story, but hardly a "horror."

I always found the experiment to be a fascinating horror story since my middle school science and history teachers talked about it in separate occasions when I was looking at disturbing topics for both classes I felt it fit better into history class instead of science

I remember covering this in my psychology degree. 20th century psychologists were fucking wild, couldn't go 5 minutes without doing some unethical experiment and traumatizing humans or animals.

Before you mentioned lord of the flies, I was already thinking about it in relation to this scenario

You can kinda see a bit of this phenomenon occur in fandoms sometimes. Especially big fandoms like Sonic and Star Wars. They got different in groups focused on liking and disliking different aspects of the franchise, but if something especially bad happens to the franchise, they can all come together with a common agreement on it. In the case of Star Wars, everyone can agree that the Holiday Special is weird af, and in the Sonic fandom, everyone can agree that Ken Penders is an asshole and wrote some pretty shoddy storylines for the Archie Sonic comics.

I really enjoy that you don't just do the same videos that all the other channels do and instead focus on the lesser known topics. These are at least lesser known to me. Great video as always!

All the results, conclussions, critic etc. aside. It would be very interesting to see such an experiment in other nationalites or ethnicities w/e. Like in europe, asia, africa and so on. Because im sure culture and the influence of parentage and developement of the children to the date of the expermient is significant.

"Yes, of course you can use my child for your social experiment. Also, take my money." How on earth did they pull that one off? Oo

Since when did John get so funny? Seriously this video had some humor to it and I enjoyed it.

Woodworking was a popular hobby. Knives were useful for camping, too.

Thank you for this video on this study.

"Hey--let's run some weird kiddie experiments and get the kids' parents to pay for it and call it 'camp'." Sounds like the Jimmy Savile method of camp development.

Compared to the last to years of government induced conflict between the in/out groups, this was pretty mild.

All this time having grown up in Oklahoma and visited Robbers' Cave plenty of times, this is the first I've heard of such influential work there.

This experiment is almost word for word like my experience with basic training in the Navy.

You would really need to do this multiple times with different methods. One where the rivalry was manipulated to take place but the adults stuck to rules like no fighting and trying to break up hostilities. One where they were in groups and kept separate and there were activities but they weren't manipulated to encourage rivalry. One where they were in groups but they weren't kept separate. Etc.

Weird how you called it the “Armenian deportations” and not genocide 🤔

One thing I cannot stress enough here. At that time, informed consent and research ethics weren't a thing. Look at things like the Milgram Experiment. Those two concepts are relatively rare in research. So, at the time this was conducted, this research was not considered unethical.

Pre-teens with weapons was a thing, but pre-teens back then had a better sense of boundaries. I was 10 when I got my first firearm (a .22-cal rifle). My friends and I would fill a pocket with ammo, strap on our 22s, and hop on our bikes to go plink tin cans in the woods. Our parents' greatest concern was, "be home in time for dinner." Nobody got hurt. And none of us kids ever considered picking up a rifle in anger. Times today are way different.

Love how researchers do experiments to find a result that was obvious and self evident.

*10:17* Oh suuuure, the principals gave THEM permission... But when I show up with candy, a boy-sized cage, and a rope, they always say no. I'm starting to see a double-standard here 😡

This was a new one for me. Never heard of this one, so I'm wondering how many more questionable experiments like this have been done! Thanks for another great video! :) Watching from a currently rainy, windy, and chilly corner of Wisconsin in the US.

11.00 Charlie says "always tell your mummy before you run off somewhere!" Now there's a blast from the past

They pushed conflict like it is in our nature only to find we don’t want to fight, in many ways governments use the lessons and tactics from these studies against society on a daily basis. Maybe despite the controversy, this experiment gave us a glimpse into something important with regard to the human animal and it’s true nature. At least it is good to see that the better side of human nature found a way to shine, despite all the negative influences being imposed by the researchers. Thanks for doing this series of videos.👍

I'm really surprised that you chose to refer to the Armenian Genocide as "Armenian deportations". I wouldn't imagine you downplaying a genocide.

Short history lesson about Robbers Cave: I was born/grew up in Oklahoma and would go to Robbers Cave at least once a year! It is so beautiful! The caves are super cool especially the history. The history consists of Belle Star and the James-Younger Gang who were very famous outlaws. She, Jessie James and the rest of the gang were being chased by the law after stealing horses. While on the run they hid out in Robber’s Cave, thus it’s name. While searching for them they were seen running into one of the caves and were quickly followed. By the time the authorities got to the cave they all had disappeared! The particular cave they hid in was more akin to a natural amphitheater. The most bizarre part is there was no escape from that particular cavern. There was no entrance to the other caves meaning it was literally a solid rock wall. No one has ever figured out how they disappeared and escaped. I can’t remember how many people from the gang there were but if I remember correctly it may have been approx 6. At any rate she later passed away in Eufaula, Oklahoma in 1889 after being shot in the back by authorities. Sorry I digressed from the content of the video… I just think it is a really cool story and wanted to share. Everyone have a blessed day!

Great video, you just exposed how American politicians and news organizations work together to keep everyone divided. Experiments like this are what gave them the formula