Being watched makes people more honest

Forget about installing discreet surveillance cameras, British researchers have found a much simpler and cheaper solution to deal with petty theft - it's a photo of the eyes.

The feeling of being watched makes us try to do the right thing, the researchers found.(Photo: iStockphoto)

Behavioral research group at Newcastle University in England has done a discreet experiment on colleagues and found that people will be more honest when being "watched" by a pair of eyes on a poster (poster ).

In the experiment, Dr. Melissa Bateson and colleagues used a box named "honest box", which was long put in a public room for 48 teachers of the school's psychology department.

Teachers have to put money into this box for the tea, coffee and milk they use without anyone watching them really paying. The honest box had been there for years, so the teachers had no doubt that any experiments were going on.

Within 10 weeks, the team placed a poster above the box, listing the prices of tea, coffee and milk. The poster also has a picture placed across the top, which is changed weekly between the flowers and the eyes.

The eye in the picture changes with gender and vision, but all are chosen so that they look directly at the observer.

Each week, the research team recorded the total amount of money collected and the amount of milk consumed because it was considered the best indicator of the consumption of drinks in general. Then, they calculated the rate of proceeds with milk consumption in each week.

Dr. Melissa Bateson (Photo: staff.ncl)

As a result, in the weeks when the "eyes" peeked down, the proceeds were 276% higher than the weeks of hanging flower photos.

"I was really surprised by this effect, which shows that the eyes are very powerful on people who drink tea and coffee," Bateson said.

Researchers say the experiment has shown that people are impressed by the subtle signs of behavior that can sabotage their reputation.

"Our brains are programmed to react to the eyes and faces whether we deliberately pay attention to it or not," Bateson said.

"Our findings indicate that people will be less selfish if they feel they are being followed - something that can be of great significance in real life."

"For example, this method can be used to warn about speed cameras. A camera image signboard will be actively processed by the brain as if it were an artificial stimulus. Driving will react faster and more positively with natural stimuli like eyes or faces ".

The team is hoping to expand the study to the larger group.

T. An