THE reality TV show Big Brother, which reaches its climax on British TV screens next week, recently took a rather sinister turn. This began by giving two participants authority over their housemates and ended almost a week later in aggression and tears.
As a psychologist who has been involved in reality TV shows for several years, it was clear to me that this episode and others like it raise serious ethical questions about the nature of participation. When people consent to take part in reality TV programmes, do they really know what they are getting into? Is their consent based on a realistic knowledge and understanding of the possible consequences for them and their families? I suspect not.
There is now an extensive record of the experiences of individuals who have taken part in such programmes. This record illustrates a significant problem: sometimes 鈥渋nformed consent鈥� is not what it implies, and not all participants realise what they are letting themselves in for.
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Big Brother is a show about the trials and tribulations of a group of people locked inside a house without contact with the outside world. Participants are filmed continuously for several weeks. The show and other similar reality TV programmes have become popular so would-be contestants can easily imagine living under the constant gaze of numerous TV cameras.
What they don鈥檛 realise, however, is that there are hidden factors beyond their control that can have profound and unexpected effects. The recent twist is a good example. To spice up the show, the producers, in the guise of the unseen and all-powerful 鈥淏ig Brother鈥� of the show鈥檚 title, turned the house into a boot camp. Two housemates were given the status of sergeants with authority over the others, the so-called privates. The sergeants also had to oversee a series of tasks that the privates were expected to complete. Unknown to the privates, the prize for successfully completing the tasks was immunity, only for the sergeants, from being thrown out of the house.
When this deception was revealed, it caused considerable trouble. Two housemates engaged in a screaming match, insults were thrown, one housemate threw a shoe at another and then broke down in tears. Many viewers might have thought this good clean fun. But for psychologists, the boot camp was redolent of a well-known experiment carried out in California in 1971 by Philip Zimbardo, a psychologist at Stanford University.
Zimbardo鈥檚 experiment involved a group of students living in a makeshift prison for two weeks. Some were told they were prisoners, others that they were guards. Within hours of its start, the guards began bullying and humiliating the prisoners. Zimbardo was forced to halt the experiment after becoming increasingly worried about the prisoners鈥� psychological health.
Of course, there are many differences between the Stanford prison experiment and Big Brother鈥檚 boot camp. For example, the housemates were all well known to each other before the boot camp was set up. But there are also important similarities. Both placed the participants in conflict with their peers and forced them to make decisions in stressful, unfamiliar situations while isolated from their normal social support network.
When people are isolated and stressed in this way, they easily lose control of their emotions and behaviour. This is one reason why informed consent is so hard to get. Do participants really understand the nature of the stress they will be placed under during the show? I doubt it.
Neither are many participants happy with the way they are portrayed, a problem that is compounded by the fact that they don鈥檛 get to see how they appear before the show is broadcast: the shock of first witnessing this portrayal while watching it later with family and friends can cause great and unexpected loss of face.
Then there is the loss of privacy. Many participants choose to take part because of the potential fame and fortune that reality programmes can bring. But even people with experience of living in the public eye 鈥� politicians, for example 鈥� are often appalled by the way they are portrayed in the press. Many participants fail to realise that they are also exposing their friends and family to the scrutiny of the press. Informed consent forms need to open participants鈥� eyes to all potential problems and consequences.
Channel 4 explains these risks to participants in a series of workshops before the show, but this is not enough. I believe oral information is seldom properly absorbed. Hopeful participants will listen with half an ear, imagining the oh-so-desirable celebrity ahead.
Participants should sign a separate informed consent form that details the hazards and acknowledges that they fully understand and accept them. In my experience 鈥� and I have used informed consent forms on many occasions 鈥� these forms highlight the pitfalls and allow those able to imagine the worst to withdraw. For the rest, participants must take some responsibility for their behaviour 鈥� on and off screen.