The Dark Side of Science: The Horrific Monkey Drug Experiment 1969 (Short Documentary)

#science #history #dark

The monkey Drug trials were a series of experiments aimed to looking into the cause of addiction.

It was conducted by Deneau, Yanagita & Seevers in 1969, and involved Monkeys being trained to self administer various drugs from caffeine to cocaine.

This controversial study shows the horror that can happen during scientific experiments.

00:00 Intro
02:49 Background
06:21 The Study
17:49 The Aftermath
20:24 Rating

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[PlainlyDifficult]

I hope you find the video interesting! Have any future suggestions let me know!!

[BinkyDoinkus]

If you were trapped in a room barely bigger than yourself, what would you do? Drink water and wait? Or take drugs and feel like you weren't trapped.

[jenniferk]

Hard to not become a drug addict when your life is spent confined to a small cage and connected to a metal harness and arm.

[krissteel]

I think even with the animal cruelty aside, its a fairly rubbish experiment in terms of how it was conducted as all it really showed was that an animal addicted to a substance will continue to take it and not necessarily finding a 'cause' along the way. Considering this was the late 60's it shouldn't have been too hard to find a lot of people engaged in some kind of drug use in the wild, then just do a deeper study on them.

[kathryncumberland]

Another study was done with rats wherein some rats were kept in a typical cage and only their basic needs were met (food, water, shelter) and the rats were kept in individual isolation. The other set of rats lived communally in a "rat utopia" that provided many forms of mental and physical stimulation. Both sets of rats had open access to a drug (I can't remember which, but I want to say it was cocaine). The first set of rats became completely addicted and used the drug until they died while the second set tried the drug to discover what it was, but ignored it thereafter.

Rats, like humans, are social animals. Just having their basic physical needs met is not enough for them to thrive. But if their basic physical needs are met and they are stimulated and accepted as part of a community, they thrive and have no need for diversions such as drugs.

EDIT: I should not have used the words "rat utopia, " as this makes it seem like I was referring to the infamous Rat Utopia experiment. I am not. I should have said that set of rats had all of their basic needs met not just physically, but socially and emotionally as well.

[leahmpalzer]

I've been through opioid withdrawals and alcohol withdrawals(dt). I empathize with those animals. That is horrific torture.

[robruben]

"Hey, so you're stuck in a nightmare with tubes to your heart. Wanna get fucked up or just sit there?" Gee who could have seen this outcome

[libertyjones]

Imagine people went to school to get a PhD and then spent time and money to get monkeys addicted to dope. They thought this was a valid and ethical usage of their skills and talents. Sad many such cases

[davidtraynor]

Very odd to make someone addicted you have to "tempt" them with a raisin. Technically that could be peer pressure but maybe the monkey just wanted a raisin, not a hallucinogenic drug. Very grim study and needn't have been done.

[Hottiefinder]

These kinds of tests say more about those who administer them, than the test subjects themselves. Absolutely shameful!

[motojunkie]

As an ex heroin addict I chose dope over everything. Family, friends and freedom. I've been clean since 2016 and now have a wife, son and my own house but the effects still linger. Some nights I wake up soaking wet after dreaming about sticking myself with the needle and my brain no longer produces dopamine so I'm dealing with depression and other shit but it gets better everyday.
If anyone out there is struggling just know it gets better once you decide you want to quit. It took me hitting rock bottom and 2 years behind bars for me to quit. I never looked back though and I'm thankful for the 2nd chance. I know to many people that will never get that opportunity.

[chocolate_gore]

The 60’s and 70’s were truly the time where scientists just did whatever the hecc

[alextaunton]

And I want to add that literally no useful conclusions were drawn from this study. All the information we know about addiction nowadays is derived mostly from human experience, with a few rat experiments here and there, but this study proved absolutely nothing and only indicated what we already knew at that point. It seems the scientists involved got carried away and did it, not because it would advance science, but merely because they could. The experiment was poorly conceived as well, and had a high chance of giving inconclusive results. As well, the studies did not include ANY information about WHY people get addicted; its purpose was to study ALREADY ADDICTED monkeys, and in that case, why not just use humans? It's not like there was a paucity of humans with addiction. The study also was highly inconclusive because, well, if you were trapped in a cage, would YOU just wanna drink water and wait, or would you wanna take drugs that make you feel better and less trapped?

It seems to me that the researchers were making a situation where taking drugs seems to be the only logical choice, making drugs available, then doing surprised pikachu face when the monkeys end up addicted. There was no study about how much addicts will ignore negative consequences, no study about WHY addicts become addicts, no study about environmental factors... just getting monkeys hooked so they could prove the obvious, which is that addictive drugs are addictive. Really a bullshit study, and this makes it more cruel because the animal suffering was completely unnecessary.

[circeciernova]

In addition to other problems with the experiment's structure, the testing of so many different substances meant that only a handful of animals could be used in any one test. Such a low number of trials all but ensures that outliers have an outsize impact on the results, and makes it easy to completely overlook other less-likely outcomes. It's important that good science be repeatable, and that requires more than just a few test subjects.

So the test only showed the obvious, and didn't even do that with convincing certainty. Not only was the Helsinki Protocol ignored, but the suffering of the test subjects, and many of their deaths, were entirely in vain.

[gabrieltorre]

People’s view on addiction is all out of whack. My mom overdosed and passed away April 28th 2022, and all I can think about is how happy I am I expressed my unconditional love to her every time I saw her. I let her know I didn’t care what she did, regardless of anything I love her. Don’t shun addicts show them there’s fun and joy elsewhere. Often times we put ourselves in that cage ourselves but it’d be nice if other people were the tiniest bit more courageous to help and open the cage. Love you mom. Sorry we couldn’t get that cage all the way open, but I know you’re not fighting anymore.

[Dekubud]

Just from the title, I could tell this was going to be a cruel and pointless experiment. Especially considering it would be incredibly easy to do an observation study with humans who already are addicted by interviewing them and their loved ones and from rehabilitation centers.

[carolinehoward]

Who could blame a poor monkey for seeking oblivion in these circumstances 😭😭😭

[m.streicher]

"both switches would be swapped around at random intervals" So assuming the monkeys could tell the switches apart, they would still never know for sure. The people who designed this test are beyond imagination.

edit They also had indicative raisins taped to the switch?!

[harlech]

Addictive drugs are addictive. What an experiment!

[carathelittlewindsong]

As someone who is in recovery from drug addiction this is honestly painful to learn and I really struggled to watch the entire video because of how cruel this experiment really was