Unexpected events and prosocial behavior: the Batman effect (2025) • Hacker News Board

Re: Unexpected events and prosocial behavior: the Batman effect (2025)

#31

Post by neilv » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 7:56 PM UTC

deadbunny wrote: post #30

neilv wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't. I think some people will, depending (as I said) on the acting. The research is about how people behave.

We live in the age, well the seeming end of the age, of superhero movies being a global phenomenon. I can't think of a single person who would see someone dressed as a superhero and think they were mentally unwell let alone a threat. Maybe it's a lack of imagination on my part but other than some people sneering at "nerds doing nerd shit" this doesn't hold at all for me.

You're imagining someone genuinely doing cosplay, not someone, who may not be a perfect actor, trying to pull that off, and also stick to experiment protocol.

AFAIK, many (most?) people can pick up on subtle cues that something is off in that person's behavior, in their expressions, body language, how and where they look and don't, etc. And the experiment intentionally draws bystanders' attention, so many of those cues will in their sight.

Perhaps this is another "further research".

Re: Unexpected events and prosocial behavior: the Batman effect (2025)

#32

Post by podocarp » Mon, Aug 10, 2026, 1:16 AM UTC

baxtr wrote: post #21

I didn’t find any mentioned of the well studied Hawthorne effect known since the 1920s or so. It describes the psychological phenomenon where people improve their social behavior simply because they know they are being observed, for example washing their hands. If I had to guess I’d say they observed exactly this. But they don’t mention it. Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawthorne_effect

How would the people on the metro know they were being observed?

Re: Unexpected events and prosocial behavior: the Batman effect (2025)

#33

Post by podocarp » Mon, Aug 10, 2026, 1:24 AM UTC

mirmor23 wrote: post #16

tweakimp wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does this mean religion can be good for the third of the population that needs an imaginary character to be good?

of course. this experiment is not novel. in the courts witness would swear on the bible (not sure now). Heard this from an Indian friend, and not sure how much of this true - Indian cities used to have problem of folks chewing tobacco and spitting everywhere, so in some places they would have an icon of a Hindu god, and it worked (maybe not with non-hindu).

You don't need to be religious to not spit in front of an idol... I mean if someone put their bag there you would also not spit there. The experiment needs to be repeated with more items!

Re: Unexpected events and prosocial behavior: the Batman effect (2025)

#34

Post by rixed » Mon, Aug 10, 2026, 5:46 AM UTC

neilv wrote: post #6

The article mentions (in a "further research" kind of way) some of the obvious reasons that superhero associations specifically might elicit this response, when other pattern-disrupting surprises might not. But there's also this: > If unexpected yet non-threatening events Culturally, in some cities, some people would wonder whether the person in the Batman costume is mentally ill and a threat (how much, varying partl…

  > culturally, you might be almost embarrassed to offer your seat

Haha exactly, but what's worse: the old person might think "damn! Another kid who believe I'm too old to stand up. Let's pretend I'm thankful to not embarrass him " :)

Re: Unexpected events and prosocial behavior: the Batman effect (2025)

#35

Post by laxpri » Mon, Aug 10, 2026, 7:32 PM UTC

profsummergig wrote: post #5

Have read about 50-100 Psychology paper abstracts. This is the first time I've understood a Psychology paper abstract in the first read. Kudos for that.

so true , this is so simple enough , this describes the whole experiment in some sentence .