A research group from Kyoto University conducted an experiment into the behavior of babies when shown an animation depicting a scene of bullying. During the experiment, a high percentage of the babies showed a deep interest in the party being bullied. It is thought that the tendency to sympathizing with the weaker party reveals the essentially benevolent nature of humankind.

The group showed 20 babies aged just 10 months an animation of one character attacking another. After the animation had finished, the babies were then made to choose between two images extracted from the same animation. One image represented the party engaging in the bullying, the other the victim. Out of the 20 babies that were used in the experiment, a staggering 16 of them (80 percent) showed a strong preference for the character being bullied.

The same research group interpreted the findings as showing babies to have a strong tendency to sympathize with those enduring pain or being subject to some form of suffering. The group also conducted the same experiment on adults, however the results suggested that upon reaching maturity the same propensity to sympathize is much less.

Professor Yasuhiro Kanokogi who lead the research team commented, “These results point towards the essentially good-nature of man.”

Maybe there’s hope for us yet!

Source: NHK News