Aripyanfar wrote:
Ok, if you took any season of Big Brother, and took it to an Ethical Review Board (which any scientific study has to pass), Big Brother would be rejected on at least 20 different counts.
I don't even do psychology, and when I watched the show I could identify multiple violations of human rights, of commonly known phychological effects on humans.
Obviously the show is knowingly designed to create great emotional stress on the contestants, in order to provoke emotional outbursts, which will make for more "interesting" TV viewing, than watching several happy and well-balanced people. Applied over such a long time period, and in combination with each other, I thought they almost guaranteed a mental breakdown. I was therefore not surprised to read an article from one of the ex-contestants claiming that a year after they all left the house, all but one of them was suffering from depression.
I can't do you a full list, because my partner can't stand the show and has vetoed it from our house, but a couple of things I remember.
1. If an individual makes a mistake, violates a rule, or loses a competition, the entire group is punished. If an individual does well, sticks to rules, or wins a competition, only that individual is rewarded. This is the reverse of what is known to work socially.
This treatment of a group is guaranteed to breed resentment, and, over time, hatred of certain individuals by the rest of the group. If a teacher treated a classroom like this they'd cause chaos.
Jails and prisoner of war camps are run like this, to keep the prisoners fighting amongst themselves, instead of being united with one another against their jailors.
2. Denying privacy to humans when you have put them in overcrowded conditions. The Big Brother house and grounds are filmed to make them appear larger than they actually are. The contestants are actually crammed into a very small house and yard.
Studies show that the more crowded people are, the more often they need to be alone, in private, even if their alone-time is spent in even a smaller area. The BB house is small, but all spaces are communal, and very not-private. The contestants are given no psychological space to substitute for the physical space they don't have.
3. The blurring of the private and public persona. Everyone needs some respect and dignity, especially at work. You also you need some time to utterly relax, unwind, and take care of some personal grooming. You maintain your respect and dignity partially by choosing carefully who you let see you totally relaxed and unguarded. Picking your nose, farting, scratching your bottom or groin, picking pimples, plucking hairs, or vomiting, are usually only done in front of those you utterly trust and love. Taking away privacy is a huge no-no in educational, scientific and medical practise, and is a common torture method.
Everything the contestents used to reserve for privacy, is shown on television, and there are no locks for privacy from their housemates.
4. Taking away secrecy, and tact. Society only works because humans tell a lot of lies of ommission. Your boss doesn't need to know you think he's an idiot. Your teacher doens't need to know you find her shoes laughable. This guest at the dinner table doens't need to know you find her laugh grating. Your mum doesn't need to know what you did with your boyfriend last night. Often people with BPD or Asperger's syndrome have to be explicitly trained not to tell all the truth all of the time.
Of COURSE the contestants know everything they do is filmed. But the cameras are mostly concealed cameras, and it's equally obvious that all the contestants go through long stretches where they have forgotten they are being filmed... or they have forgotten all the consequences of that. All of them have long conversations about each other that later are going to have nasty consequences once everyone is out of the house, and has seen the tapes. There have even been instances of contestants telling massive and blatant lies to each other, apparently oblivious that the lies will be instantly exposed once they leave the house.
There are also conversations about family and friends outside the house that are going to have ugly consequences once the contestants leave and get back to their "real world". Big Brother capitalises on this "you forgot you were being filmed" effect as much as possible, by showing clips of these moments, or bringing them up in discussion, on the eviction shows.
I don't even do psychology, and when I watched the show I could identify multiple violations of human rights, of commonly known phychological effects on humans.
Obviously the show is knowingly designed to create great emotional stress on the contestants, in order to provoke emotional outbursts, which will make for more "interesting" TV viewing, than watching several happy and well-balanced people. Applied over such a long time period, and in combination with each other, I thought they almost guaranteed a mental breakdown. I was therefore not surprised to read an article from one of the ex-contestants claiming that a year after they all left the house, all but one of them was suffering from depression.
I can't do you a full list, because my partner can't stand the show and has vetoed it from our house, but a couple of things I remember.
1. If an individual makes a mistake, violates a rule, or loses a competition, the entire group is punished. If an individual does well, sticks to rules, or wins a competition, only that individual is rewarded. This is the reverse of what is known to work socially.
This treatment of a group is guaranteed to breed resentment, and, over time, hatred of certain individuals by the rest of the group. If a teacher treated a classroom like this they'd cause chaos.
Jails and prisoner of war camps are run like this, to keep the prisoners fighting amongst themselves, instead of being united with one another against their jailors.
2. Denying privacy to humans when you have put them in overcrowded conditions. The Big Brother house and grounds are filmed to make them appear larger than they actually are. The contestants are actually crammed into a very small house and yard.
Studies show that the more crowded people are, the more often they need to be alone, in private, even if their alone-time is spent in even a smaller area. The BB house is small, but all spaces are communal, and very not-private. The contestants are given no psychological space to substitute for the physical space they don't have.
3. The blurring of the private and public persona. Everyone needs some respect and dignity, especially at work. You also you need some time to utterly relax, unwind, and take care of some personal grooming. You maintain your respect and dignity partially by choosing carefully who you let see you totally relaxed and unguarded. Picking your nose, farting, scratching your bottom or groin, picking pimples, plucking hairs, or vomiting, are usually only done in front of those you utterly trust and love. Taking away privacy is a huge no-no in educational, scientific and medical practise, and is a common torture method.
Everything the contestents used to reserve for privacy, is shown on television, and there are no locks for privacy from their housemates.
4. Taking away secrecy, and tact. Society only works because humans tell a lot of lies of ommission. Your boss doesn't need to know you think he's an idiot. Your teacher doens't need to know you find her shoes laughable. This guest at the dinner table doens't need to know you find her laugh grating. Your mum doesn't need to know what you did with your boyfriend last night. Often people with BPD or Asperger's syndrome have to be explicitly trained not to tell all the truth all of the time.
Of COURSE the contestants know everything they do is filmed. But the cameras are mostly concealed cameras, and it's equally obvious that all the contestants go through long stretches where they have forgotten they are being filmed... or they have forgotten all the consequences of that. All of them have long conversations about each other that later are going to have nasty consequences once everyone is out of the house, and has seen the tapes. There have even been instances of contestants telling massive and blatant lies to each other, apparently oblivious that the lies will be instantly exposed once they leave the house.
There are also conversations about family and friends outside the house that are going to have ugly consequences once the contestants leave and get back to their "real world". Big Brother capitalises on this "you forgot you were being filmed" effect as much as possible, by showing clips of these moments, or bringing them up in discussion, on the eviction shows.
Very interesting post. I'm reminded of an old Law & Order episode about a murder amongst reality TV show cast members. It covers most of the qualities you mentioned above and mentioned how a lot of these "reality" shows aim at picking contestants who will end up conflicted.
Anyway, I'm a big fan of both Discovery and History channel shows. They contain more reality then any other show I've seen.
Ultimate Fighter is neat although most of the time I find myself only tuning in for the last 10 minutes of the show.
I'm also embarrassed to say I watched Top Chef pretty religiously. Cooking is a little hobby of mine so I could put up with the extra non-sense they had on the show.