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Privacy Statement Blue eyes, brown eyes: What Jane Elliott's famous experiment says about race 50 years on. The basic idea was to separate the class into two halves, students with blue eyes and those with brown. "We are repeating the blue-eyed/brown-eyed exercise on a daily basis.". "They shot that King yesterday. Need an original essay on Essay Sample: Ethical Concerns in Jane Elliot's Experiment? How can put those little children through that exercise for a day? And they seem unable to relate the sympathy that theyre feeling for these little white children for a day to what happens to children of color in this society for a lifetime or to the fact that they are doing this to children based on skin color every day. At first, she cooperated with me. PDF TRAUMA-RELATED PSYCHOLOGY EXPERIMENTS - Boston University Elliot wanted to show that the same thing happens in real life with brown eyed people (minority). She could feel a chasm forming between the two groups of students. From the University of California Press website: The never-before-told true story of Jane Elliott and the "Blue-Eyes, Brown-Eyes Experiment" she made world-famous, using eye color to simulate racism. Today, she says, it's still playing out as the U.S. reckons with racial injustice. A Class Divided: An Experiment Involving Race and Prejudice ", For years scholars have evaluated Elliott's exercise, seeking to determine if it reduces racial prejudice in participants or poses a psychological risk to them. Many critics that the children were too young to understand the exercise. "She taught in this school for 18 years." Want a quality guarantee? She attended a oneroom rural schoolhouse.Today, at 72, Elliott, who has short white hair, a penetrating gaze and no-nonsense demeanor, shows no signs of slowing. APA principles acknowledge that individuals rights to privacy, self-determination, and confidentiality is paramount to all psychological activities. The kids in the bottom group became timider and kept to themselves. Why'd they shoot that King?" Order from one of our vetted writers instead. Although Jane Elliot's intentions were to teach the youngsters about racism, ethical issues related to the simulation were raised. Was The Blue Eyes Brown Eyes Experiment Ethical? The Brown Eyed / Blue Eyed Experiment - 980 Words | Bartleby She told them that people with brown eyes were superior to those with blue eyes, for reasons she made up. The first thing that Jane Elliott did was divide the children into groups: those with blue eyes and those with brown eyes. Or alternatively you may decide to keep them in ignorance of what is happening. Shermer and Bloom discuss: "Blue Eyes, Brown Eyes" Jane Elliott famous racism experiment reactions to it (in the classroom, locally, nationally, internationally) whether the "experiment" was really more of a demonstration public interest, from Johnny Carson to Oprah Winfrey the questionable ethics of the experiment what it reveals about tribalism, racism . "The browneyed people are the better people in this room," Elliott began. (2022, Apr 06). Elliot's approach to the experiment involved creativity in which the pupils' age and ability to comprehend discrimination was taken into account. The blue-eyed participants faced discrimination for two and a half hours. Two years later, a BBC documentary captured the experiment in Elliott's classroom. One caller complained that white children would not be able to handle . "She stirs people up. Jane Elliott, one of the most controversial figures in U.S. education and diversity training, began her journey to international acclaim in Riceville, Iowa. PDF Discrimination: Experimental Evidence from Psychology and Economics We Are Repeating The Discrimination Experiment Every Day, Says - KQED According to the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct, 2010 the experiment also violates the principle of Integrity. She told them that people with brown eyes were better than people with blue eyes. Hire a professional with VAST experience! She slumped. Brian, the Elliotts' oldest son, got beaten up at school, and Jane called the ringleader's, mother. "You have to put the exercise in the context of the rest of the year. It seemed to evince that all white people had to do to learn about racism was restrain themselves from an impulse to engage in made-up cruelty. On the "Tonight Show" Carson broke the ice by spoofing Elliott's rural roots. "It's the same thing over and over again," Cross says. Their 12-year-old daughter, Mary, came home from school one day in tears, sobbing that her sixth-grade classmates had surrounded her in the school hallway and taunted her by saying her mother would soon be sleeping with black men. This was intentional. You must get the parents first. As a result of those divisions, you see racial discrimination or even terrorism. Solve your problem differently! When Sarah, the Elliotts' oldest daughter, went to the girls' bathroom in junior high, she came out of a stall to see a message scrawled in red lipstick on the mirror: "Nigger lover.". You have the right color eyes!. ", Elliott says the role of a teacher is to enhance students' moral development. Some guidelines for avoiding or reducing this effect are: In conclusion, Jane Elliotts experiment demonstrates the fragility of coexistence and cooperation. "He's a bluey! Elliott reminded them that the reason for the lesson was the King assassination, and she asked them to write down what they had learned. "It's happening every day in this country, right now," she said in an interview with Morning Edition. In 1968 after Martin Luther King was assassinated the United States was in turmoil. Thats just the way blue-eyed kids were, Elliott told the students. In present society, psychological experiments are guided by honesty, truthfulness, and accuracy. One caller complained that white children would not be able to handle the exercise and would be seriously damaged by the exercise. "It changed my life. When the blue-eyed group saw that the brown-eyed group was going to be seated first, some became upset. You've still got that same sweet smile. In 1970, a documentary about the exercise was released. And StanfordUniversity psychologist Philip G. Zimbardo writes in his 1979 textbook, Psychology and Life, that Elliott's "remarkable" experiment tried to show "how easily prejudiced attitudes may be formed and how arbitrary and illogical they can be." You didnt understand the directions. The Blue Eyes Brown Eyes exercise continues to be relevant. She then told them that the children with blue eyes were inherently inferior to the children with brown . They are steeped in centuries of economic deprivation and cultural appropriation. Days after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. On Friday, April 5, 1968, in Riceville, IA, a third-grade student walked . Role Theory: Expectations, Identities, and Behaviors. He printed them under the headline "How Discrimination Feels." A smart blue-eyed girl who had never had problems with multiplication tables started making mistakes. Jane Elliott's Blue Eyes and Brown Eyes experiment was a turning point in social psychology. She also made the brown-eyed students put construction paper armbands on the blue-eyed students. Exercise or Experiment-- An Account of Jane Elliott's Tenacity: A In this article, we'll explain what happened during the experiment and discuss its consequences. The study also violates the American Principles of Psychologist codes of conduct making its replication or further investigation unethical. Cookie Settings, Kids Start Forgetting Early Childhood Around Age 7, Archaeologists Discover Wooden Spikes Described by Julius Caesar, Artificial Sweetener Tied to Risk of Heart Attack and Stroke, Study Finds, Rare Jurassic-Era Insect Discovered at Arkansas Walmart. Blue or Brown; A Classroom Divided | Applied Social Psychology (ASP) They didnt need to engage with a single Black person. On the first day of the experiment, she declared the brown-eyed group superior and gave them extra privileges like seconds at lunch, extra recess time, and access to the new school playground. On the first day of the experiment, Elliott told the children who had blue eyes that they were superior to the children with brown eyes; that they were better, nicer and smarter. It occurs to me that for a teacher, the arrival of new students at the start of each school year has a lot in common with the return of crops each summer. Later, it would occur to Elliott that the blueys were much less nasty than the brown-eyed kids had been, perhaps because the blue-eyed kids had felt the sting of being ostracized and didn't want to inflict it on their former tormentors. "Why?" She appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show five times. Elliott continues, "Just when you think that the fertile soil can sprout no more, another season comes round, and you see another year of bountiful crops, tall and straight. Elliotts bullying rejoinder to any nonbeliever was to say that however much pain a white person felt after one or two days of made-up discrimination was nothing when compared to what Blacks endure daily. 980 Words. It brings up immediate anger and hatred. "You better apologize to us for getting in our way because we're better than you are," one of the brownies said. The nearest traffic light is 20 miles away. Fourteen years later, the students featured in The Eye of the Storm reunited and discussed their experiences with Elliott. "Things are changing, and they're going to change rapidly if we're very, very fortunate," she said. In the case of any doubt, it's best to consult a trusted specialist. Essay Sample: Ethical Concerns in Jane Elliot's Experiment. The second day, Elliott reversed the groups. . The Blue Eyes & Brown Eyes Exercise. The act of treating students differently was obviously a metaphor for the social decisions made on a larger level. This procedure is sometimes so subtle that no one notices it happening. This way, she successfully created two distinct groups in her classroom: The consequences of the minimal group became evident very quickly. New York: Elsevier Science. Elliott is nothing if not stubborn. Words are the most powerful weapon devised by humankind. When the exercise ended, some of the kids hugged, some cried. It also documents small-town White America's reflex reaction to the . We Are Repeating The Discrimination Experiment Every Day, Says - NPR In the most uncomfortable moments, Elliott reminds the students of violent acts caused by racism or homophobia. That might have been the end of it, but a month later, Elliott says, Johnny Carson called her. She has appeared on the "Oprah Winfrey Show" five times. The documentary has become a popular teaching tool among teachers, business owners, and even employees at correctional facilities. She would conduct the exercise for the nine more years she taught the third grade, and the next eight years she taught seventh and eighth graders before giving up teaching in Riceville, in 1985, largely to conduct the eye-color exercise for groups outside the school. These initial criticisms didnt stop Elliott. She gave all of the students simple spelling and math tests two weeks before the exercise, on the days of the exercise, and after the exercise. The corn grows so fast in northern Iowafrom seedling to seven-foot-high stalk in 12 weeksthat it crackles. ", Elliott defends her work as a mother defends her child. Thus, the dominant group, supported by the authorities, will always have the upper hand. It was the day after Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in 1968 that Elliott ran her first "Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes" exercise in her Riceville, Iowa classroom. ", We stopped on Woodlawn Avenue, and a woman in her mid-40s approached us on the sidewalk. It was typical of Elliott's blunt styleno "Good morning," no small talk. She wanted them to understand what discrimination felt like. It has since evolved into an online blog and YouTube channel providing mental health advice, tools, and academic support to individuals from all backgrounds.

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