sciencetech-blog

comments

Power may corrupt but it can also makes people messy eaters, scientists have found.

They discovered that influential people quickly develop bad table manners, such as chewing with their mouths open and showering crumbs all over themselves.

Psychologists think that temporary changes to the frontal lobe in the brain may be to blame, which makes people more impulsive and self-centred.

Scroll down for video 

Psychologists have discovered that people in a position of power are likely to treat themselves to any remaining pieces of food on a plate (illustrated), displaying selfish tendencies, and quickly develop bad table manners, such as chewing with their mouths open and showering crumbs all over themselves

Psychologist Dacher Keltner and his team at the University of California, Berkeley, made the discovery when conducting an experiment that they refer to as the 'cookie monster study,' so called perhaps, because of the Sesame Street character's vigorous way of eating biscuits.

In it, they divided volunteers into groups of three and arbitrarily appointed one of them as leader.

They then gave the trio a boring task – devising some university policies – before bringing out a surprise plate of chocolate chip cookies. 

The University of California: How power makes people selfish

Psychologist Dacher Keltner and his team at the University of California, Berkeley, made the discovery when conducting an experiment that they refer to as the 'cookie monster study,' so called because of the Sesame Street character's vigorous way of eating biscuits (pictured in a stock image)

In a video explaining the experiment, Dr Keltner explained: 'Everybody takes one cookie, but all groups always leave one cookie on the plate, because they don't want to be that person that takes the last cookie.'

They discovered that half of the time, the leaders reached out to take the final cookie, perhaps showing they have become more selfish while in power.

Dr Keltner said that one of his graduate students noticed that appointed leaders in the experiments often had bad table manners.

'Our high-power person is more likely to eat with their mouth open, lips smacking, crumbs literally like falling onto their sweater. It's ridiculous,' he said.

He explained that 'when you powerful, you kind of lose touch with other people. You stop attending carefully to what other people think.'

This is because when people are given power, they share some traits with sociopaths.

Regions of the frontal lobe, referred to as the 'empathy network' help people detect other people's pain.

Victims of head trauma, who suffer damage to empathy networks, often become impulsive, so that model citizens with 'acquired sociopathy' can suddenly start swearing and yell at people, as well as feeling disconnected.

'Our lab studies find, if you give people a little bit of power, they look a little bit like those brain trauma patients,' Dr Keltner said.