People are more likely to give money to a cause and to obey the rules when they are standing underneath a picture of watchful eyes. Melissa Bateson, a human behavior researcher, found that people put far more money in donation boxes underneath posters of watching eyes than they did in boxes under pictures of flowers. For over a year, Newcastle police have been using this information to help them fight crime. The weird part is that it works.
The police designed posters which feature Big Brother-esque watching eyes and are supposed to deter crime by making people “more honest.” It’s unclear how research on being more generous with charity translates into people being more honest when they are about to commit crimes, but the Newcastle police claimed that robberies went down 17 percent after they implemented the posters as part of Operation Momentum. The whole thing was so successful that they are now deep into deploying Operation Momentum 2.
Researcher Bateson says:
Our brains are programmed to respond to eyes and faces whether we are consciously aware of it or not. Our research suggests that people are less likely to be selfish if they feel they are being watched, which has huge implications for real life.
Big Brother wants you to be less selfish, OK? Doesn’t that sound nice?
You are being watched [The Presurfer]
