09.30.07
A new reading of the Robbers Cave experiment
Very interesting reading of a famous experiment conducted at Robbers Cave State Park in Oklahoma. (Full disclosure: I’m from Oklahoma originally.) It starts:
The Robbers Cave experiment, a classic study of prejudice and conflict, has at least one hidden story. The well-known story emerged in the decades following the experiment as textbook writers adopted a particular retelling. With repetition people soon accepted this story as reality, forgetting it is just one version of events, one interpretation of a complex series of studies. As scholars have returned to the Robbers Cave experiment another story has emerged, putting a whole new perspective on the findings.
First though, the more familiar story…
