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Nearly 70% of men chose to shock themselves instead of being bored for 15 minutes
(startrek.website)
this post was submitted on 01 Nov 2023
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Did they know how painful the shock was beforehand? If they were just told, "This button will give you a shock, we'll leave you alone for 15 minutes," I'm guessing alot of it may have just been to test it out. Most guys were probably like, "It's probably not that bad, I can handle it." Without knowing anything specific about this study (though I feel like I've heard about something similar before), I'd argue that this may have just been more a case of people testing the limits of the study/themselves, plain curiosity, and not people just shocking themselves repeatedly because the thought of being bored for 15 minutes was so completely unacceptable. Though if it's the same thing I heard about, I think at least one person did do this, but that's more likely an outlier and somebody who may have actually gotten something out of it.
I'm not sure what it says about Men vs Women though, maybe how well they heed warnings from "authoritative figures" (ie the people running the study).
There's not much you can tell about the study from just the one graph. I can say that I personally would probably end up shocking myself just out of curiosity. Like what's the point of just sitting there for 15 min?
They did know how painful it was beforehand, and 100% of participants said they would pay to not be shocked again. Notably, it was a very small sample size for the shock study, 18 men and 24 women, but similar "sit there and do nothing" studies were done across all age groups (18-77)
Source: https://news.virginia.edu/content/doing-something-better-doing-nothing-most-people-study-shows
If someone asked me if I'd pay not to be shocked I'd say no under the assumption of I didn't it'd become some billionaires new business idea.
When I was growing up, my oh so loving mother decided I wasn't allowed to be in the house alone and she would only pay for child care for my brother.
I got very used to sitting outside the back door starving for 4 hours after school waiting for her to get home.
15 minutes is nothing. I'd probably only just get started on a good daydream by then.
And, yes, I'm no-contact with my mother.
What the actual fuck, why?
She saw my dad in me, and she utterly loathed my dad. She was all sorts of messed up. She was too young, she blamed everyone else for her problems. I was an 8 year old boy upon whom she was able to take out her anger with no immediate consequences. Beatings, neglect, and screaming at me how all men were dirty r-pists who give women cancer via sex. She hugged me and told me she loved me once, when I was dying in hospital (I got better, obviously).
Christ thats rough, hope youre in a better place now.
Yeah, much better. I escaped across the Atlantic lol, and found an amazing woman, my soulmate who gets me like nobody else.
Thank you for listening, it can be tough on people reading that kind of stuff.
My ADHD 🧠: "I'm not sure the shock would be more painful than the boredom..."
There's an electric fence where I volunteer to keep animals out, and apparently it's quite painful if you accidentally touch it, but not lethal. I constantly have to fight my curiosity to know just how painful it is, so I don't blame them.
When I was growing up, a neighbor had an electric fence for their dogs, and a bunch of us bored kids would take turns daring each other to touch it. It hurt like hell.
I worked at a dog kennel and they had small wires on top of the fences to dissuade them from going over. Obviously, it had to be tested. It was like a 9volt battery to the body. It guess one could describe it as painful but I found it more weird than anything. 7/10 did it several times.
Interestingly, the people who owned the kennel also raised horses. That fence I touched on accident and it absolutely sucked. Parts of me were also numb for almost a minute. 1/10 do not recommend
I have one of those electric tennis racket fly swatters. More than once we’ve sat around the campfire shocking ourselves for the fun of it
Well let me tell you. It's a lot more painful if you're barefoot than if you're in work boots. Either way won't blow off a finger, though.
From my one experience on my cousin's farm, it felt like he had given me a solid kick to the ass. I legitimately thought he kicked me in the seat, and asked him why he did it. He said he didn't, it was the electric fence.
Once was enough.
We have hotwires for cows; they're of varying power. The one we use around the home yard is pretty powerful, puts out like 10kV because it's used to run about 2 miles of crossfences.
One day I was crossing a fence in the pens, being careful to not touch the wires with my skin (you can step on the wires just fine and lever yourself around on the top of a fencepost). So as I swing my leg over, my foot slips, and I land with my nuts on the top wire. Now, it's also barbwire, so besides getting my nuts shocked as I land on the wire, I can't pull myself off the wire because the barbs are in my pants and skin. I managed to kinda roll off the fence, getting jolted every second or so, and when I fall the crotch of my pants rip out and the shocks finally end.
Suffice to say, a fence that keeps cows inside is a little bit much to take when you have electrified barbs stuck in your balls and you can't pull away.
So that's my story about getting my testicles fried on a beautiful country day. Fairly sure whatever these students experienced wasn't a patch on my lovely fence-hop.
Just one shock?! I'd be trying that within 30 seconds. Now a shock that doesn't stop. Nope.
If this is the study I'm thinking of, one particular guy just kept shocking himself nearly a hundred times. Some people are just built different
I'd enjoy knowing I was an interesting statistic in the experiment. Maybe I can be an outlier worthy of a footnote or appendix.
I'd just be curious enough how much it's going to hurt to make myself do it. It's not like it's going to be debilitating.
Yeah this would be my thought process - I know it's a study, so it's not actually dangerous, id be kind of bored at that point and curious as to what's gonna happen
The better question is why the others didn't
Dont kink shame bro....seriously though I enjoy low level shocks, its pleasant and not even in a sexual way.
15m is a long time......
15m feels like half an hour, which is basically all day
Pain is preferable to many things. Boredom & nuisances to name 2.
I'll admit that I'd be curious.
Of course I’m gonna shock myself, it’s the only way to silence the voices
I wonder about the occupations of those who were tested? I bet there are some who would take the shock and say "ehh, I've had better".
Kinks ☕
Anyone have a link to the study? I'd love to read it!