Psychology — the science of the mind — rings noble, therapeutic, and sage-sounding. We imagine therapists with sweet smiles, notebooks full of compassion, and studies that assist humanity to elevate. But behind that veil, there are tales. Bizarre tales.
Breathtaking ones. Tales where morality dissolved into curiosity and human beings were turned into test subjects in the interests of science. All experiments may not be remembered. Some were lost under the burden of remorse. Others were too bizarre to find their way into textbooks. And yet… they did occur. So let's go through eight of the strangest psychological experiments — the ones no one warned you about. Not the shock test of Milgram. Not Stanford prison. These are the ones that were quieter, weirder, and occasionally crueller. The ones that leave a queasy taste in your mind.
1. The Monster Study (1939)
At a tiny Iowa orphanage, a batch of kids were unwittingly brought into an experiment that would come to be labelled "The Monster Study." Speech pathologists Wendell Johnson and Mary Tudor were curious to see if stuttering was learned or genetic. So they did the unthinkable: they took a group of orphans who had normal speech and informed half of them that they had a speech problem, rebuking them, criticising them sternly, marking them as defective. The outcome? Some of the children acquired lifelong speech problems, fear, and emotional damage. All in the name of science. No apology. No consent. Just silence.
2. The Three Christs of Ypsilanti (1959)
Three patients. All institutionalised. All are profoundly schizophrenic. All are identified as Jesus Christ. Psychologist Milton Rokeach assembled them at Michigan's Ypsilanti State Hospital, asking: What if delusions meet? Would they correct each other? Heal? Confront reality? Instead, the men argued. One would say, “You’re not Jesus, I am!” Another would insist, “You’re crazy, not me.” They fought. They dismissed each other as machines, liars, or mentally ill. The study lasted two years. Nothing changed — except the confusion deepened. Rokeach later admitted the experiment was more about his own curiosity than their healing. And that perhaps, “I was playing God with their minds.”
3. The Elephant LSD Experiment (1962)
Scientists at the Oklahoma City Zoo administered an enormous dose of LSD — 297 milligrams — to Tusko the elephant, 3000 times the amount an individual would use. They wanted to determine whether it would stimulate so-called "musth," a condition of violent mating behaviour. But Tusko fell over in minutes. He convulsed, struggled, and died soon after. No genuine scientific understanding resulted from the experiment. Only a sad death, and a haunting reminder: occasionally, science loses sight of compassion in its quest for knowledge.
4. David Reimer: The Boy Raised as a Girl (1965)
This was not an experiment. This was a life moulded by a hypothesis. When baby David Reimer had his penis accidentally removed during a circumcision, psychologist John Money advised raising him as a girl — to prove that gender identity was purely the result of nurture, not nature. Thus, David became Brenda. Dresses. Dolls. Therapy sessions with his twin brother became more and more sinister. But Brenda never felt quite right. She acted out. Felt lacerated. At age 14, she found out the truth and went back to being male. Years later, David committed suicide. John Money never even admitted full harm. But David's case transformed the way we understand identity, consent, and the destructive price of psychological theories applied to human subjects.
5. The Facial Feedback Hypothesis (1988)
and something a little more lighthearted — but still bizarre. In this study, subjects were instructed to hold a pen in their mouth — either in the teeth (as a smile) or in the lips (as a pout). Then, they rated cartoons for humour. People who were pretending to smile rated cartoons as more humorous. The study proposed something very strong: perhaps our faces can influence our emotions. Smile more, feel better. The body is leading the mind. Decades on, replication problems raised questions. But the theory lingered — not because it was definitive, but because it was oddly optimistic.
6. The Good Samaritan Experiment (1973)
Would a religious individual take a moment to assist one in need? Princeton psychologists Darley and Batson enlisted theology students and instructed them to prepare a lecture on the parable of the Good Samaritan — you know, that tale about assisting a stranger. On the way to the lecture hall, an actor faked being hurt in the hallway. Many students hurried right by him, particularly when they were informed they were late. The takeaway? Oftentimes, the pressure of life can overcome ethics. Even when we're actually preaching to be kind, we may not practice what we preach if we're pressed for time.
7. The "Lost in the Mall" Study (1995).
Can you be persuaded of a memory that never occurred? Psychologist Elizabeth Loftus had volunteers remember childhood memories — including one fictional tale: becoming lost in a shopping mall. Years later, roughly 25% of individuals "remembered" the fabricated event, some with great detail. The implications were enormous. If memory is so malleable, what does that mean about eyewitness accounts, trauma memory, or even therapy? Loftus was receiving death threats. But her research paved the way for discovering just how malleable and flimsy our minds are.
8. Rat Park (1970s)
Addiction. Most of the early studies employed rats in cages with water that contained drugs. The rats would lever-press repeatedly until they died, implying that drugs were unavoidable and addictive. But psychologist Bruce Alexander had other plans. He constructed Rat Park — a big, social, playful space full of other rats, toys, food… and yes, the water with the drugs in it. Outcome? Rats hardly touched the drugs. They preferred connection to chemicals. The implication was revolutionary: addiction could not be merely about the substance, but about setting, isolation, and cage. And overnight, the entire addiction conversation changed.
Final Thoughts: The Curious, Cruel, Beautiful Mind.
Each of these experiments, in some way or another, attempted to learn about the behaviour of humans — memory, morality, identity, or despair. Some of them were unethical. Some of them were misguided. Some of them were just… odd. But all of them show us something: the mind is both very powerful and surprisingly fragile. Psychology isn't solely about comprehending people. Occasionally, it's about the ease with which people can be misled, manipulated, or hurt — even by someone who is trying to help. So we learn from these tales. Not as a way of blaming the past, but in order to learn from it. Because when we learn about the odd, we come closer to seeing what it means to be human.