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Weird experiments

frogFrom never leaving your bed to floating frogs in mid air, there's a world of weird experiments to discover. Read on to discover five of our favourites below.

A year in bed?

We all like a lie-in but imagine not being able to leave your bed for a whole year! In 1986 11 men volunteered to do just that as part of an experiment to test the effect of weightlessness on earth.

The research took place in Moscow and once all the participants took to their beds they did not get up again for a whole 370 days. They washed, ate, read books, watched TV, played games and argued lying down.

Each volunteer was rewarded for their participation with a car. After three months only one volunteer quit – it turned out he already had a car.

Read more on this experiment on Weird Experiments

A fantastic Dr Fox

You’d probably expect a lecture entitled ‘mathematical game theory as applied to physician education’ to be quite taxing on the brain.
But an experiment in 1970 showed that it wasn’t the content that people pay attention to- it’s all in the delivery!

Dr Myron L Fox gave his lecture on the subject to a roomful of experts at the University of California but with an unusual twist.

The entire lecture was nonsense and, unbeknown to the roomful of experts who listened to it, Dr Fox was an actor.

He was hired to see if people would be so impressed by the excellent delivery of a speech that they’d ignore the fact the content didn’t make sense. The conclusion was that it worked - the experts didn’t notice a thing.

Read more on this experiment on Weird Experiments

The 28-hour day

Busy people are often heard complaining ‘there are not enough hours in the day’. But would having an additional four hours help? Sleep researcher Nathaniel Kleitman tried to find out by living out a 28-hour day in a cave in Kentucky.

For 32 days Kleitman and his student Bruce Richardson would sleep for nine hours, work for ten and spend the other nine hours as free time.

It took Richardson one week to get used to the longer day but Kleitman just couldn’t get the hang of it.

To laugh or not to laugh? That is the question

In 1933 Professor Clarence Leuba decided to examine whether laughing when tickled is a response we have learned by imitating others or whether it comes naturally.

To put it to the test he banned anyone from laughing in the presence of his newborn son while he was being tickled.

All seemed to be going well until his wife confessed to laughing while playfully bouncing the baby one day after his bath time. We don’t know if this ruined the experiment but by month seven his son was laughing playfully when tickled.

The flying frog

Ever wondered how you could make a frog fly? No? Most likely you’re not the only one, but it’s a question that bothered Andre Geim and Michael Barry so much, they found a solution.

Their experiment involved using strong magnets to levitate a frog. The pair was so successful they won the 2000 Ig Nobel Prize for the physics category.

Read more on this experiment on Professor Sir Michael Berry’s university page.

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Your shout!

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