I think society is ruder than it used to be, and I’m not alone in thinking this. Paul Piff is an assistant professor in the department of psychology and social behaviour at the University of California. Last year, he wrote a paper titled Higher Social Class Predicts Increased Unethical Behaviour. In layman’s terms, what Prof Piff is saying is, rich people are more likely to behave like twats than poor people are.
Piff proved his suspicions in a number of ways, many of them involving the use of hidden cameras. One of his experiments, which he shared during an unintentionally hilarious TEDx talk, meant getting some of his mates to stand at pedestrian crossings and monitor which cars stopped and which didn’t. Normal cars (ie ones that look like their sole purpose is to transport people safely from A to B without exploding) stopped – which, incidentally, they were legally obliged to do. “Status cars”, such as 4x4s, convertibles, sports cars, chariots and the Diamond Jubilee State Coach, did not. Piff had proved, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that people who buy expensive cars enjoy killing pedestrians, which definitely qualifies as unethical behaviour.
Another of Piff’s films showed two young men playing a rigged game of Monopoly. One player was given an unfair advantage: more money, two dice, a crash course in Received Pronunciation, a massive throne to sit on, an ermine cloak and the Sovereign’s Orb. The behaviour of this player changed rapidly. He started playing in an incredibly annoying, obnoxious way.
The most fascinating part, for me, was that, even though he knew he was at an unfair advantage, the player still believed he had won the game through personal skill. I thought immediately of George Osborne cutting the maintenance grant for Monopoly players from low-income families, and how this meant that working-class kids would now always lose at Monopoly, so won’t even bother trying to play any more.
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Originally Posted by ralphy
