WEBVTT - A Game of Telephone, Part 2 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:06.840 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:13.440 --> 0:00:15.280 Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. 0:00:15.360 --> 0:00:18.880 My name is Robert Lamb and I am Joe McCormick. 0:00:19.000 --> 0:00:22.000 And today we are returning with part two in our 0:00:22.079 --> 0:00:27.200 series on the Telephone Game, a children's game in which 0:00:27.240 --> 0:00:30.520 a secret message is passed along from one player to 0:00:30.600 --> 0:00:34.159 the next in a chain, until finally the original message 0:00:34.200 --> 0:00:37.519 and the message that emerges at the end are both announced, 0:00:37.560 --> 0:00:41.320 so everybody can see how the information was either preserved 0:00:41.360 --> 0:00:45.720 faithfully or horribly mangled by the passing from mouth to 0:00:45.760 --> 0:00:48.400 ear so many times. Now, if you have not heard 0:00:48.400 --> 0:00:50.720 part one of the series, I think this is a 0:00:50.760 --> 0:00:52.720 case where you really should go back and check that 0:00:52.760 --> 0:00:53.080 one out. 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:53.360 First. 0:00:53.400 --> 0:00:55.680 We lay a lot of the groundwork for what we're 0:00:55.720 --> 0:00:59.160 talking about today in the first episode, but as a 0:00:59.160 --> 0:01:02.240 brief refresher, we talked about some of our memories of 0:01:02.280 --> 0:01:05.759 these games from childhood, and we also discussed a very 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:09.880 famous and influential series of experiments from roughly a century ago, 0:01:10.480 --> 0:01:14.480 discussed in a book by the British experimental psychologist Frederick C. 0:01:14.800 --> 0:01:20.280 Bartlett called Remembering a Study in Experimental and Social Psychology. 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:23.039 That book came out in nineteen thirty two. Now, the 0:01:23.120 --> 0:01:27.000 experiments described by Bartlett in this book concerned what is 0:01:27.080 --> 0:01:31.880 called serial reproduction, which is very similar to the telephone game, 0:01:31.920 --> 0:01:35.840 but involves a written component. So basically, a person would 0:01:35.880 --> 0:01:38.440 be given a text to read, and this could be anything. 0:01:38.720 --> 0:01:41.000 It could be a transcription of a folk tale, it 0:01:41.040 --> 0:01:44.200 could be a newspaper article, a passage from a book, whatever, 0:01:44.600 --> 0:01:47.600 And then that person is allowed to read it several times, 0:01:47.680 --> 0:01:50.320 and then it's taken away, and then later they are 0:01:50.360 --> 0:01:54.040 asked to reproduce the text as accurately as they could 0:01:54.400 --> 0:01:58.280 from memory. Then that reproduction would be the text given 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:00.920 to the next person in the chain would do at 0:02:01.000 --> 0:02:03.640 the best they could to reproduce that from memory, and 0:02:03.680 --> 0:02:07.960 so on down the chain for an arbitrary number of reproductions. Now, 0:02:08.000 --> 0:02:11.680 what Bartlett found in these experiments was that his text 0:02:11.720 --> 0:02:17.000 based version of the telephone game in most cases produced radical, 0:02:17.240 --> 0:02:22.480 profound alterations to the original story or message. And to 0:02:22.600 --> 0:02:25.960 read from his conclusion of that chapter quote, epithets are 0:02:26.080 --> 0:02:30.840 changed into their opposites, incidents and events are transposed, names 0:02:30.840 --> 0:02:34.680 and numbers rarely survive intact for more than a few reproductions. 0:02:35.040 --> 0:02:40.240 Opinions and conclusions are reversed. Nearly every possible variation seems 0:02:40.280 --> 0:02:43.120 as if it can take place, even in a relatively 0:02:43.200 --> 0:02:47.079 short series. So I wanted to begin today by following 0:02:47.160 --> 0:02:49.320 up on Bartlett's work, which we talked about in the 0:02:49.360 --> 0:02:51.720 last episode, because it cast a very long shadow in 0:02:51.760 --> 0:02:55.040 the study of memory and cultural transmission of information. But 0:02:55.080 --> 0:02:57.440 obviously this book is from a very long time ago, 0:02:57.600 --> 0:02:59.720 so I wanted to see whether there were any more 0:02:59.720 --> 0:03:04.440 recent and scientific reviews commenting on whether his work on 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:07.920 serial reproduction has stood the test of time and or 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:12.040 been successfully replicated. So I found a few papers. One 0:03:12.360 --> 0:03:16.920 was actually focused on Bartlett's repeated reproduction experiments. That's where 0:03:17.440 --> 0:03:20.519 the same person tries to recall a story or piece 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:24.440 of information at different time intervals after being exposed to it, 0:03:24.480 --> 0:03:28.240 as opposed to the serial reproduction experiments where it's given 0:03:28.280 --> 0:03:31.399 from one person to the next. But this study did 0:03:31.680 --> 0:03:35.440 briefly address the other Bartlett experiments in the background section. 0:03:35.880 --> 0:03:39.560 This paper was ken Bartlett's repeated reproduction experiments be replicated 0:03:39.600 --> 0:03:42.720 by Bergmann and Rodeger in Memory and Cognition in nineteen 0:03:42.800 --> 0:03:46.800 ninety nine, and the authors say that quote serial reproduction 0:03:46.920 --> 0:03:50.520 can often lead to dramatic distortions in recall over repeated 0:03:50.560 --> 0:03:54.680 reconstructions of the event. Although rarely used now, this experimental 0:03:54.680 --> 0:03:58.320 technique was used in later studies with results generally confirming 0:03:58.440 --> 0:04:03.880 those of Bartlettlogists interested in transmission of rumors use this technique, 0:04:04.200 --> 0:04:07.640 among others. And then I found another study from more 0:04:07.640 --> 0:04:10.560 recent years. This was from twenty fourteen in the Journal 0:04:10.560 --> 0:04:14.440 of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition by Rodigerette. I'll 0:04:14.440 --> 0:04:19.200 called Bartlett Revisited Direct Comparison of repeated reproduction and serial 0:04:19.240 --> 0:04:23.240 reproduction techniques, and in their review the authors say, in 0:04:23.320 --> 0:04:27.360 some virtually every experiment we can find using Bartlet's serial 0:04:27.400 --> 0:04:32.520 reproduction technique confirms his observations that social transmission of information 0:04:32.839 --> 0:04:35.480 is error prone and that the more links there are 0:04:35.480 --> 0:04:38.640 in the chain, the greater the probability of error. So, 0:04:38.800 --> 0:04:42.120 putting all this together, it looks to me like subsequent 0:04:42.200 --> 0:04:44.960 research may have found some differences at the margins, but 0:04:45.160 --> 0:04:49.120 for the most part, Bartlett's findings about the telephone game 0:04:49.200 --> 0:04:52.520 process have been confirmed. When you do this particular type 0:04:52.520 --> 0:04:54.920 of experiment where one person gets to read a story 0:04:55.000 --> 0:04:57.440 and then they're supposed to repeat it as accurately as 0:04:57.480 --> 0:04:59.680 they can from memory, and you go on and on. 0:05:00.240 --> 0:05:02.480 All the different kinds of changes that we talked about 0:05:02.480 --> 0:05:06.240 in the last episode are introduced. Now there might be 0:05:06.279 --> 0:05:09.840 some important caveats based on what the genre of the 0:05:09.880 --> 0:05:12.440 information is, and we can talk about that later in 0:05:12.480 --> 0:05:15.200 this episode, but for the most part, one of my 0:05:15.240 --> 0:05:18.400 big takeaways from this is we should all be very 0:05:18.600 --> 0:05:23.240 cautious about believing rumors, even if you trust that the 0:05:23.279 --> 0:05:28.240 person directly sharing the information with you is not a liar, 0:05:28.360 --> 0:05:30.400 because this is something people always say when you know, 0:05:30.480 --> 0:05:33.919 when you hear a rumor, people say like, oh, but Johnny, 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:36.240 who told me this isn't a liar? Why would he 0:05:36.320 --> 0:05:37.760 tell me this if it wasn't true. 0:05:38.279 --> 0:05:41.279 M Yeah, that's a good point, though. I think the 0:05:41.320 --> 0:05:44.200 only example of rumors that you should take to the bank, 0:05:44.800 --> 0:05:46.479 the only example is going to be the of course 0:05:46.520 --> 0:05:50.000 the eleven studio album by Fleetwood Mac, which absolutely holds 0:05:50.080 --> 0:05:52.560 up no doubt about it. 0:05:52.880 --> 0:05:54.119 That's just secondhand news. 0:05:55.080 --> 0:05:57.760 There's also a track you also have the chain on there, 0:05:58.000 --> 0:05:59.840 so take that into account. 0:06:00.080 --> 0:06:01.839 I do love Fleetwood Mac, but I got to ding 0:06:01.920 --> 0:06:06.120 them for a false meteorological fact that they perpetuate in 0:06:06.160 --> 0:06:08.760 one of their songs with the statement the thunder only 0:06:08.800 --> 0:06:11.160 happens when it rains. That is not true. 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:15.440 Yeah, absolutely incorrect, But to your point, Yeah, that's a 0:06:15.480 --> 0:06:18.520 good point on rumors, sort of like the dark side 0:06:18.520 --> 0:06:22.640 of this this phenomenon. I really like the idea of 0:06:22.680 --> 0:06:26.080 the of the storytelling element and the chain of storytellers 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:31.000 within a given oral storytelling tradition or what have you. 0:06:31.080 --> 0:06:34.480 Like it just it made me rethink and reanalyze the 0:06:34.560 --> 0:06:37.200 role of the storyteller in a given culture. You know 0:06:37.279 --> 0:06:41.239 that with each transmission of this story, you may lose 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:44.039 so many great things, but you also may gain things. 0:06:44.279 --> 0:06:47.520 It's going to introduce new ways to make this content 0:06:48.640 --> 0:06:51.919 more agreeable with an audience, more beneficial to the audience, 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:55.039 more entertaining, though at the same time also opening it 0:06:55.120 --> 0:06:57.760 up to further manipulation so that the message of the 0:06:57.800 --> 0:06:59.640 story could also be misused. 0:07:00.120 --> 0:07:03.040 Absolutely. I mean this is noted I think by Bartlett himself, 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:05.760 but also in many papers I was reading about this research. 0:07:06.080 --> 0:07:08.960 So the thing is that, yes, this should make us 0:07:09.040 --> 0:07:13.600 very skeptical of the objective accuracy of much of memory 0:07:13.640 --> 0:07:18.560 and of chains of information sharing between people, especially where 0:07:18.600 --> 0:07:21.520 the whole process cannot be reviewed with a fixed record, 0:07:21.600 --> 0:07:24.160 because the crucial element of this here is that you 0:07:24.280 --> 0:07:27.240 only have to work with what the previous person told you. 0:07:27.680 --> 0:07:30.440 It's a totally different thing if like it's all done, 0:07:30.800 --> 0:07:34.000 maybe it's all done in writing or somehow it's all recorded, 0:07:34.040 --> 0:07:36.520 and you can go back and review what the story 0:07:36.680 --> 0:07:40.320 was at each point in its history. But for this 0:07:40.440 --> 0:07:42.880 type of information sharing, yes, it should make us skeptical 0:07:43.320 --> 0:07:47.960 about objective accuracy in reproduction of the original. But this 0:07:48.040 --> 0:07:51.679 doesn't mean that the way people process information and serial 0:07:51.720 --> 0:07:55.800 transmission is bad. It just means that you shouldn't rely 0:07:55.880 --> 0:07:59.080 on it to get objective, accurate accounts. It may not 0:07:59.160 --> 0:08:02.080 be good for that, but it's good for other things. 0:08:02.360 --> 0:08:06.320 It's great for creating culture, for enlivening art and narrative 0:08:06.360 --> 0:08:11.000 across time and making it always newly relevant, for maintaining 0:08:11.040 --> 0:08:15.720 friendship and social bonds, for teaching applicable lessons in everyday life. 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:19.160 In fact, several papers I was reading pointed out that 0:08:19.360 --> 0:08:24.440 in fact, this combination of conservation and distortion of information 0:08:24.560 --> 0:08:27.840 at the same time through transmission from person to person 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:32.080 could be viewed as metaphorically similar to the combination of 0:08:32.480 --> 0:08:37.760 conservation and distortion in biological evolution. Life can only exist 0:08:37.840 --> 0:08:41.840 on Earth where there is the appropriate balance of conservation 0:08:42.400 --> 0:08:46.600 and distortion of genetic information. So genetic traits are heritable 0:08:46.960 --> 0:08:50.000 and they're passed on from one generation of organisms to another. 0:08:50.400 --> 0:08:54.600 But species survive in a changing environment because they're able 0:08:54.600 --> 0:08:57.200 to adapt and evolve, and they're able to adapt and 0:08:57.240 --> 0:09:02.600 evolve when mutations distortions of that genetic information prove beneficial 0:09:02.640 --> 0:09:05.440 to them. Though it's interesting to note, I think that 0:09:05.520 --> 0:09:08.760 the error rate is probably much higher in the transmission 0:09:08.920 --> 0:09:12.520 of most genres of verbal information than it is for 0:09:12.760 --> 0:09:16.800 genetic information and organisms. Like in life, accurate transmission of 0:09:16.840 --> 0:09:20.840 genes is the norm and mutations are the exception. When 0:09:20.840 --> 0:09:23.480 we're telling stories to each other or repeating something we 0:09:23.520 --> 0:09:26.800 read in the newspaper to a friend. In that kind 0:09:26.840 --> 0:09:30.960 of verbal memory based transmission, mutations are much more the norm. 0:09:31.280 --> 0:09:33.160 But at the same time, I think about how there 0:09:33.200 --> 0:09:36.440 I guess there is a higher survival tolerance there, Like 0:09:36.480 --> 0:09:41.080 a single harmful mutation can prove fatal to a bacterium, 0:09:41.679 --> 0:09:44.840 But how does that work in the analogy for transmitting information? 0:09:45.800 --> 0:09:49.200 Is it possible that one memory error could kill a 0:09:49.240 --> 0:09:52.199 piece of information and prevent it from spreading further. 0:09:52.920 --> 0:09:55.240 I guess so, you know, like the example of the 0:09:55.480 --> 0:10:00.240 story of the ghost Battle the Ghost Warriors and in 0:10:00.520 --> 0:10:04.960 the last episode, you know, like sometimes if certain details, 0:10:04.960 --> 0:10:10.760 certain descriptions, certain narrative choices are removed, like you can 0:10:10.800 --> 0:10:13.760 take the heart out of a particular story, a particular myth, 0:10:14.320 --> 0:10:18.080 and could impact the degree to which people want to 0:10:18.120 --> 0:10:19.880 pass it on or need to pass it on. 0:10:20.280 --> 0:10:23.079 That's a good point. Yes, This thing that Bartlett noticed 0:10:23.080 --> 0:10:26.319 where certain details this is he called the leveling process, 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:31.679 where individualizing characteristics and stylistic details from a story are 0:10:31.800 --> 0:10:35.000 stripped out as they are reproduced by people who don't 0:10:35.000 --> 0:10:39.080 remember them because they deem them inessential, not realizing that 0:10:39.320 --> 0:10:42.360 the soul of the story lies in those details. The 0:10:42.440 --> 0:10:44.920 fact that those details are now missing could make the 0:10:44.960 --> 0:10:47.920 story so uninteresting to the person who hears it that 0:10:47.960 --> 0:10:51.400 they would never share it again. That's a good point. 0:10:51.960 --> 0:10:53.480 But wait a minute. I wanted to come back to 0:10:53.520 --> 0:10:56.319 something I started saying a minute ago. This thing about 0:10:56.520 --> 0:11:00.280 believing rumors, where people are often inclined to believe or 0:11:00.320 --> 0:11:03.240 because they don't want to believe the individual person who 0:11:03.280 --> 0:11:06.480 shared the rumor with them is a liar, And I 0:11:06.480 --> 0:11:09.559 think that that is such a misguided mentality because, first 0:11:09.559 --> 0:11:12.520 of all, and less related to the experimental findings we're 0:11:12.520 --> 0:11:15.280 talking about here, the person who shared the rumor with 0:11:15.360 --> 0:11:17.880 you may not be a liar, but you know less 0:11:17.920 --> 0:11:20.559 about the person who shared the rumor with them, and 0:11:20.640 --> 0:11:23.520 who that person heard it from, et cetera. You can't 0:11:23.600 --> 0:11:27.920 usually inspect the entire chain of transmission, only the person 0:11:27.960 --> 0:11:31.800 you're directly getting it from. But more relevant to today's topic, 0:11:32.120 --> 0:11:36.080 it's absolutely clear from these experiments that massive distortions of 0:11:36.160 --> 0:11:40.920 original source material can creep into human transmission chains, even 0:11:40.960 --> 0:11:44.400 when the person isn't a liar. When they're not trying 0:11:44.440 --> 0:11:47.160 to distort it, they're trying as best they can to 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:50.800 accurately reproduce it. And that's in cases where the person 0:11:50.960 --> 0:11:54.319 is not personally invested in the subject matter, where they 0:11:54.320 --> 0:11:57.840 have no incentive to exaggerate and they're just trying to 0:11:57.880 --> 0:12:01.559 reproduce the material as best they can. How much worse 0:12:01.600 --> 0:12:04.680 will things be in the real world. Will distortions be when, 0:12:05.000 --> 0:12:08.640 like somebody is personally invested in the material, maybe in 0:12:08.679 --> 0:12:12.040 it presenting a certain way, when they do have incentives 0:12:12.040 --> 0:12:15.360 to exaggerate or otherwise distort the material, whether that's to 0:12:15.559 --> 0:12:19.240 maybe make it more entertaining, more impressive, more illustrative of 0:12:19.280 --> 0:12:21.959 a point they want to make, or whatever, and when 0:12:22.000 --> 0:12:26.520 they're not necessarily conscious of being scrutinized for accuracy. 0:12:27.000 --> 0:12:29.520 Yeah, so there are all these different types of unconscious 0:12:29.920 --> 0:12:32.720 changes and event of course, intentional changes that can take place. 0:12:33.240 --> 0:12:36.000 And the result is that some details in the story 0:12:36.120 --> 0:12:38.360 or the rumor or what have you, some will change, 0:12:38.400 --> 0:12:40.920 some will remain, and there will also be a sharpening 0:12:41.040 --> 0:12:46.000 of things, you know, like an exaggeration. But what does 0:12:46.000 --> 0:12:48.640 it all mean? I was looking at a handful of 0:12:48.640 --> 0:12:53.640 papers discussing transmission chain experiments and the transmission of urban 0:12:53.720 --> 0:12:56.920 legends and other stories, which I thought seems like a 0:12:56.920 --> 0:12:58.720 really good area to look at, because a lot of 0:12:58.720 --> 0:13:01.480 times urban legends is actually I mean, we're not talking 0:13:01.520 --> 0:13:05.360 about literature, we're not talking about myths. They often kind 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:09.000 of come out of nowhere, and the way in which 0:13:09.000 --> 0:13:12.640 we pass them on sometimes feels more akin to like 0:13:12.720 --> 0:13:15.200 older oral storytelling traditions. 0:13:15.880 --> 0:13:18.080 Well, right, because the case with urban myths is you 0:13:18.120 --> 0:13:23.160 at least usually assume that they were created by many minds. 0:13:23.200 --> 0:13:26.560 You know, they're the product of this transmission chain, rather 0:13:26.640 --> 0:13:30.000 than say, being originally written down in a fixed form 0:13:30.080 --> 0:13:33.040 by one person and then other people have tried to 0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:36.800 replicate it across time, though in fact there are variation, 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:39.760 like some urban legends do come from books. That's a 0:13:39.800 --> 0:13:42.640 funny thing that pops up occasionally, like it was originally 0:13:43.000 --> 0:13:45.280 a story somebody wrote, was published in a sci fi 0:13:45.360 --> 0:13:48.240 magazine somewhere, and then it got turned into an urban 0:13:48.320 --> 0:13:50.439 legend and morphed along along the chain. 0:13:51.040 --> 0:13:53.320 Yeah, and of course, speaking of the chain, we have 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:57.360 to acknowledge the email chain of technology changes things. Technology 0:13:57.400 --> 0:13:59.320 ends up bringing us a scenario or end up with 0:13:59.360 --> 0:14:03.480 things like like pasta creepy pasta and so forth, where 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:06.760 it's something that is, as the name alludes to, generally 0:14:07.040 --> 0:14:10.320 just copied and pasted, though sometimes there are augmentations made, 0:14:10.400 --> 0:14:12.960 and then of course everyone has received it or at 0:14:13.080 --> 0:14:14.520 least in times pasted. I don't know if this is 0:14:14.520 --> 0:14:17.080 still a thing so much, but when a family member 0:14:17.280 --> 0:14:21.160 forwards you an email and it has some sort of 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:25.640 perhaps unbelievable quality to it, some sort of tall tail 0:14:25.720 --> 0:14:28.400 or urban legend at the heart of it. But nothing 0:14:28.440 --> 0:14:32.760 has changed except for the string of forwards that are 0:14:32.760 --> 0:14:34.040 at the top of it where you can see all 0:14:34.040 --> 0:14:36.000 these people that have passed it on like a chain letter. 0:14:36.520 --> 0:14:38.480 But if I don't forward this, I'm going to look 0:14:38.480 --> 0:14:40.240 in the mirror and see a ghost and it will 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:40.640 kill me. 0:14:41.120 --> 0:14:52.760 That's right, in seven days. So one of the papers 0:14:52.760 --> 0:14:55.400 I was looking at was from Storytelling to Facebook by 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:59.440 Alberto Orcibi, published in Human Nature in twenty twenty two. 0:15:00.200 --> 0:15:06.160 This particular paper utilized a registered online pair of studies, 0:15:06.640 --> 0:15:09.880 one using a traditional transmission chain set up, and the 0:15:09.920 --> 0:15:13.040 other asking subjects whether they would be likely to share 0:15:13.080 --> 0:15:16.560 a story on social media or with friends, you know, 0:15:16.640 --> 0:15:21.760 in a anonymous or attributed status. 0:15:21.840 --> 0:15:24.400 So I thought this was really interesting. So, if I'm 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:28.400 understanding right, the author wanted to compare different types of 0:15:28.440 --> 0:15:31.840 information sharing in the modern era. One is more like 0:15:31.880 --> 0:15:34.160 the experiments we've been talking about, where somebody has to 0:15:34.200 --> 0:15:38.040 pass along the story effortfully by like using their memory 0:15:38.360 --> 0:15:41.280 to retell the story as they understand it, like in 0:15:41.320 --> 0:15:46.400 the Bartlett experiments, versus the technology assisted passing along of 0:15:46.440 --> 0:15:50.640 a story passively in its original unaltered form. You know, 0:15:50.720 --> 0:15:52.600 you just click the button to share, so you're not 0:15:52.640 --> 0:15:56.200 actually changing it. In that case, you're just deciding whether 0:15:56.320 --> 0:15:59.360 or not you want this same original piece of media 0:15:59.400 --> 0:16:01.320 to go to all of the people following you. 0:16:01.920 --> 0:16:05.120 Yeah. Yeah, So just some of the very quick sort 0:16:05.120 --> 0:16:08.800 of findings from this. First of all, negative content was 0:16:08.800 --> 0:16:12.840 both better transmitted and transmission chain experiments and shared more 0:16:13.120 --> 0:16:14.760 than its neutral counterpart. 0:16:15.320 --> 0:16:17.920 That should not be surprising based on all the studies 0:16:17.920 --> 0:16:21.160 of what does well online negative content works. 0:16:21.640 --> 0:16:26.440 Yeah. Next, threat related information was successful in transmission chain experiments, 0:16:26.800 --> 0:16:31.520 but not when sharing straight up. So that's that's interesting 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:33.360 as well, and again kind of matches up with what 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:37.640 we tend to understand about, you know, why we pass 0:16:37.720 --> 0:16:40.400 something on why we would we would tell someone a 0:16:40.440 --> 0:16:45.600 particular story. And then finally, information eliciting disgust was not 0:16:45.760 --> 0:16:48.680 advantaged in either, which which is interesting. 0:16:49.120 --> 0:16:50.000 That's surprising to me. 0:16:50.080 --> 0:16:52.920 But okay, I guess you know some people. I guess 0:16:53.000 --> 0:16:55.680 maybe it depends on the population. Again, this is this 0:16:55.800 --> 0:17:00.360 was a small study, but it does seem like there 0:17:00.360 --> 0:17:02.200 would be individuals who are like, hey, I got a 0:17:02.200 --> 0:17:05.159 disgusting story I need to tell you listen to me. 0:17:06.320 --> 0:17:08.919 But maybe other's not so much, or maybe it's like 0:17:08.960 --> 0:17:11.720 the disgusting thing that we might might be the thing 0:17:11.760 --> 0:17:15.560 we sort of focus on, like maybe it's ultimately something 0:17:15.600 --> 0:17:18.520 about it being negative or something about it being threat 0:17:18.560 --> 0:17:21.879 related that is more important to the transmission than merely 0:17:21.920 --> 0:17:26.200 the discussed Now, the author points out that content biases 0:17:26.240 --> 0:17:30.320 are strongest when memorization and reproduction aren't involved in the 0:17:30.359 --> 0:17:33.679 transmission of information, as in the telephone game and the 0:17:33.720 --> 0:17:37.560 traditional oral transmission of narratives. Now, another paper I was 0:17:37.600 --> 0:17:40.439 looking at pointed out some other great ideas related to this. 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:44.879 It's titled serial Killers, Spiders and Cybersex, Social and Survival 0:17:44.920 --> 0:17:48.600 Information by Us in the Transmission of Urban Legends by 0:17:48.680 --> 0:17:51.600 stubbards Field at All, published in the British Journal of 0:17:51.640 --> 0:17:56.760 Psychology in twenty fourteen. Okay, oh, it's great time. The 0:17:56.800 --> 0:17:59.399 authors point out that when we take in information and 0:17:59.440 --> 0:18:02.959 retell it, various cognitive selection pressures kick in to make 0:18:03.000 --> 0:18:07.360 sure it's maximally transmittable. This can alter structure, it can 0:18:07.400 --> 0:18:13.719 alter content, and transmissibility depends on three factors salience, accuracy 0:18:13.760 --> 0:18:16.480 of recall, and motivation to pass it on. 0:18:17.160 --> 0:18:19.160 Okay, so can you explain that The. 0:18:19.119 --> 0:18:20.760 Way I was thinking about is in terms of, like, 0:18:20.760 --> 0:18:22.920 all right, you've heard a good joke and you want 0:18:22.920 --> 0:18:24.919 to retell that joke? Why do you want to retell 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:27.600 that joke? Is it good? Is it notable? Is it 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:31.520 attention grabbing in any way? Can you actually remember the 0:18:31.560 --> 0:18:34.800 beats well enough to retell it? And then why are 0:18:34.800 --> 0:18:38.080 you retelling it? Is it timely? Is it entertaining? Is 0:18:38.119 --> 0:18:40.840 it particularly cutting? Are you just trying to create a distraction? 0:18:41.280 --> 0:18:43.479 You know, don't sort of lift the mood. All of 0:18:43.520 --> 0:18:46.720 this matters without any of us having to actively check 0:18:46.760 --> 0:18:48.760 these boxes off in our head. We don't have to 0:18:48.800 --> 0:18:51.680 actually think, like, all right, can I read? Because Lord knows, 0:18:51.720 --> 0:18:54.760 plenty of people launch into a joke without trying to 0:18:55.200 --> 0:18:57.679 without making sure that they can actually retell all the 0:18:57.760 --> 0:19:04.120 necessary beats first, So you're not necessarily conscious of all 0:19:04.119 --> 0:19:06.560 of this as you're about to retell something. 0:19:06.640 --> 0:19:09.560 The horse goes into the doctor's office, has a long face. 0:19:10.440 --> 0:19:14.080 The horse says, why is my face like this? I 0:19:14.080 --> 0:19:15.880 don't remember the rest? Yeah? 0:19:16.000 --> 0:19:19.439 Yeah, But still, it's like you're taking a joke or 0:19:19.440 --> 0:19:22.280 some other bit of information. If it ends with you, 0:19:22.400 --> 0:19:25.000 there's a reason, and if you pass it on, there's 0:19:25.000 --> 0:19:28.040 a reason as well. So the first and third factors here, 0:19:28.160 --> 0:19:33.040 salience and motivation depend on social information bias and survival 0:19:33.080 --> 0:19:36.399 information bias. In other words, coming back to the joke 0:19:36.560 --> 0:19:39.160 or say an urban legend, does the thing you were 0:19:39.200 --> 0:19:45.280 passing on contained to any degree social information or survival information? 0:19:45.760 --> 0:19:48.400 Hmm okay, Yeah. 0:19:48.200 --> 0:19:50.359 It's really interesting to think about this because indeed, some 0:19:50.440 --> 0:19:54.399 of the memorable ideas out there, be they jokes, urban legends, 0:19:54.480 --> 0:19:57.760 or what have you, at least seem to have some 0:19:57.840 --> 0:20:02.439 sort of social revelation or commentary baked into them, and 0:20:02.680 --> 0:20:05.359 or some sort of information that seems to contain a 0:20:05.480 --> 0:20:08.080 lesson on how to survive in the world. 0:20:08.640 --> 0:20:08.800 Yeah. 0:20:08.800 --> 0:20:11.800 I mean, you're not necessarily processing this. You're not thinking like, oh, 0:20:11.800 --> 0:20:13.960 this is a good urban legend. I can use this, 0:20:13.960 --> 0:20:16.199 This might save my life tomorrow. You might not be 0:20:16.280 --> 0:20:18.919 thinking that, but that could be like the reason that 0:20:18.960 --> 0:20:20.600 you're inclined to remember it. 0:20:20.840 --> 0:20:22.879 I think a lot of the jokes that people find 0:20:22.920 --> 0:20:27.119 the funniest are ones that make a playfully negative observation 0:20:27.359 --> 0:20:28.879 about general human nature. 0:20:30.240 --> 0:20:30.400 Yes. 0:20:30.800 --> 0:20:33.160 Classic example, the two hunters in the woods they see 0:20:33.160 --> 0:20:35.880 a bear charging at them. One kneels down to tie 0:20:35.960 --> 0:20:38.960 his shoes. His friend says, why are you tying your shoes? 0:20:39.000 --> 0:20:41.440 You can't outrun a bear. The guy tying his shoes says, 0:20:41.440 --> 0:20:43.119 I don't have to outrun a bear, I just have 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:43.840 to outrun you. 0:20:44.680 --> 0:20:47.520 Yeah. Yeah, So you can look to examples like this. 0:20:47.680 --> 0:20:51.440 They are also various parables and coens that really zing 0:20:51.600 --> 0:20:54.840 because they seem to reveal something about human nature. Likewise, 0:20:54.840 --> 0:20:57.040 you can also point to a lot of negative examples, 0:20:57.440 --> 0:21:01.840 things that contain disinformation or just hurt ideas or stereotypes, 0:21:02.840 --> 0:21:05.360 but true or not, they seem to have some sort 0:21:05.400 --> 0:21:08.480 of social information. Now on the survival information front, the 0:21:08.520 --> 0:21:11.880 first place my mind went to was the old urban 0:21:11.960 --> 0:21:14.640 legend of hey, don't flash your lights or your car 0:21:14.720 --> 0:21:17.760 lights at another car that doesn't have its lights on, 0:21:18.200 --> 0:21:20.480 because you know what's going on. This is a murder 0:21:20.520 --> 0:21:24.680 gang initiation. There gang members in that car. They're intentionally 0:21:24.760 --> 0:21:27.280 riding around without their headlights on, and if you flash 0:21:27.280 --> 0:21:30.080 your lights at them, you may think you're generally reminding 0:21:30.119 --> 0:21:31.679 them that they need to turn their lights on. They 0:21:31.840 --> 0:21:33.679 but know it'll be on and they will come and 0:21:33.760 --> 0:21:34.200 kill you. 0:21:34.240 --> 0:21:37.920 So this allegedly has survival information. You need to know this. 0:21:38.000 --> 0:21:40.920 If you don't know this, you could die, right. 0:21:41.200 --> 0:21:43.919 It seems to be important on some level and then 0:21:43.960 --> 0:21:47.959 gets transmitted and passed on it. Of course, completely false. 0:21:48.000 --> 0:21:50.520 This was an urban legend that began in the nineteen eighties, 0:21:50.560 --> 0:21:53.399 has no truth to it, though at times got passed 0:21:53.400 --> 0:21:58.119 on by reputable and semi reputable sources. But again, it 0:21:58.240 --> 0:22:02.240 seems to have survival information inside it, and therefore there's 0:22:02.280 --> 0:22:03.360 a stickiness to it. 0:22:03.520 --> 0:22:04.160 That makes sense. 0:22:04.200 --> 0:22:06.920 Okay, Now back to the paper itself. They conducted a 0:22:07.000 --> 0:22:11.600 very small study but found quote legends which contained social information, 0:22:11.760 --> 0:22:15.679 social type legends which contained survival information survival type, and 0:22:15.840 --> 0:22:19.720 legends which contained both forms of information combined type were 0:22:19.760 --> 0:22:24.200 all recalled with significantly greater accuracy than control material, while 0:22:24.280 --> 0:22:27.760 social and combined type legends were recalled with significantly greater 0:22:27.920 --> 0:22:30.480 accuracy than survival type legends. 0:22:30.720 --> 0:22:33.680 Well, counterintuitive is it may be that social and combined 0:22:33.720 --> 0:22:37.280 beats out survival. I am not really surprised by that, 0:22:37.359 --> 0:22:39.560 because I don't know what is the what is the 0:22:39.840 --> 0:22:42.360