<experiments are in a way deceiving ppl if you want best results the ppl – depend on the experiment – need to be unaware of the exact experiment

I'm aware that if you are doing an experiment you don't tell subjects exactly what you are researching. But that still doesn't give you permission to do unethical things – and you cannot threaten your test subject in the way that Soohyun has done (his assistants are not allowed to quite the study unless they pay him, Hyerim isn't allowed to withdraw either).

<but in the drama he will probably cancel the experiment all together

Still not by ep. 6. Instead, he withdrew himself as Man A, found a replacement, decided he didn't like the replacement and therefore he is now going to take out the replacement and put himself back into the experiment again...

unlike legal "ethical" is a cultural thing we see ethic differently according to our upbringing and environment so what you find unethical i do not

and of course part of the drama is the realization of "real" love by CSY and of course all the regular trops
so it wont be till later eps that he will stop the experiment

this is theconclusion of the drama
but what noce about it that instead of the regular
"cant fallinlove" "cold person" "trauma"
they use an experiment t quantify love

this notion to me is new in kdrama and what hooked me to this drama in the first place

as well as having a fortune teller who doesnt believe in that - also a new one in kdrama and up my ally

@nara

<unlike legal “ethical” is a cultural thing we see ethic differently according to our upbringing and environment so what you find unethical i do not

Sure. But Dr. Fancypants Standford is going to try to publish the results of his experiment in a top international journal of his discipline, meaning it's going to have to undergo rigorous peer review. Though, to be honest, I think the peer reviewers are going to be less hung up about the ethics (it's not like Soohyun is waterboarding Hyerim for the sake of science or something) than the total lack of scientific method in the experiment.

@Jon G.

<Who am I to judge him for something that is apparently okay with Korean ethics committees?

Hehehehe. Now I'm getting visions of experiments conducted under repressive regimes... This is nothing compared to those of course.

This sums up my biggest beef with this drama. How on earth is anything about Sung Joon's character believable in any way, shape or form? He's supposed to be a respected researcher and doctor in his mid thirties, yet he looks like a 16 year old who just decides women are certain ways and here is this one experiment I did to prove it.

As a woman, I am continually baffled and insulted by his behavior. In the latest episode he tried to FIRE her because he developed feelings for her! As a person with sense, I am insulted by how stupid the story line is and how two dimensionally the characters play off each other. It doesn't feel like anyone has real relationships with each other. To be honest, I must still be watching to see if this show has any ability to grow, but given how its handling psychology and patient cases, I have little to no hope.

It is pretty stunning how unlikable the protagonist is, though. The fact that she might forgive and believe him after all this . . . I so badly want her character to kick him to the curb, but she seems to get less aware with each episode. It's quack talking to quack. I feel sorry for their patients.

@Hinako_Sensei

<How on earth is anything about Sung Joon’s character believable in any way, shape or form?

Right?!

<It doesn’t feel like anyone has real relationships with each other.

It's bizarre. I feel like this drama is telling me there are deep feelings (between people that barely know each other and have treated each other quite terribly – I mean, what's "attracting" Hyerim to a guy that keeps belittling her and tries to control her?), but everything I'm seeing is extremely superficial.

< The fact that she might forgive and believe him after all this . . . I so badly want her character to kick him to the curb, but she seems to get less aware with each episode.

I find it her character very oddly written. Like she seemed spunky and smart in the first couple of episodes, and now she's getting stupider by the minute? I understand that people can be manipulated, but Soohyun isn't convincing enough to qualify as a manipulator (say, like abusers in a relationship with DV are), he's a total fake.

can you explain what you mean by

"This experiment has NOTHING scientific about it. Not the lead researcher. Not his wishy-washy hypothesis."

how do you think "scientific" experience are done?

can you explain what you mean by

“This experiment has NOTHING scientific about it. Not the lead researcher. Not his wishy-washy hypothesis.”

how do you think “scientific” experience are done?

I'm not alua, but let me try to answer this question.

A scientific experiment in general is an organised and detailed sequence of steps to validate (or reject) a hypothesis.

Soo-hyun doesn't have a testable hypothesis. His experiment is definitely not consisting of detailed and organised steps that would be necessary to reproduce it.
It features exactly zero of the characteristics of a scientific experiment.

The discipline of the experiment seems to be Emotion Psychology, a part of General Psychology. As such, experiments are about traits of the human mind in general. Opposed to studies(not: experiments) in Clinical Psychology that often focus on one or few individuals with certain mental issues, General Psychology experiments need to be robust against individual characteristics of the test subjects. To do that, you need a number of subjects in your experiment that is significantly larger than "1".
Experiments in social sciences are very difficult to design correctly. Validity is really an issue here. His experimental setup is not reproducible, is not independent of the experimenters, violates almost all variables to nullify internal validity and has no external validity in the first place.
Even if it was a scientific experiment in general, it wouldn't be a psychological experiment.

That is, of course, before we even look at the way the "experiment" is carried out: He arbitrarily changes variables throughout the experiment, he doesn't have a consistent cover story, he lies in an ad-hoc fashion to the test subject about aspects of the experiment, he arbitrarily gives information about the experiment to the test subject, he puts pressure on the test subject to participate, and so on and so forth.
Even if it was a planed scientific psychological experiment, the way he's conducting it would destroy any scientific value (that it honestly never had in the first place).

And that's before we even start to talk about the ethic aspect ...

thanx jon although it was cynically meant
to show this experiment is done correctly academic wise

"Soo-hyun doesn’t have a testable hypothesis. His experiment is definitely not consisting of detailed and organised steps that would be necessary to reproduce it.
It features exactly zero of the characteristics of a scientific experiment."

completely disagree
moreso it was done so many times bf

and by the way for the purpose of advertisement

what exactly is un scietntifically about it?

you have and hypothesis and you ut it to the test
it would have been completely acceptable in theory in academia

only problem is that ppl are pretty wary of the "love" subject since it affects everyone in someway

about the one with him and HR will be canceled after since he will fall for her for real
and in fact participating at all
of course we know fromthe start that his wanting to participate is not objective

im talking about bf of course

and what they do give us is what supposed to happen vs how he manipulates to his advantage

but is we think about the proximity issue

if in all dramas -kdramas in fact- the surprise proximity is used to show attraction of the couple for one another

here we know it is to cause invasion of privacy that cause a "flattering" which the person then mistake for attraction to the other person

which we saw how SH used it on HR and making her heart bit fast and her perplexed reaction

they give us true reason to why our heart flatter even as viewers

since it is a kdrama and they NEVER depict professionalism in any thing well maybe food industry

but any other industries or professions were NEVER depicted truthfully so it is part of watching a kdrama to accept this potholes as they are always there

Thank you, Jon G., you're saving me a lot of time and saying it better than I would have. :-D

I think I can only add other than the fact that a significantly larger number of subjects is needed (which should not be randomly chosen – you don't just pick the pretty ahjumma from the café downstair), a control group is also required.

<He arbitrarily changes variables throughout the experiment

This is driving me bonkers!!! He puts himself in the experiment, took himself out of it, and now he's just decided he's going to be in again! I guess he's drugged up by "love" but this is just ridiculous.

completely disagree
moreso it was done so many times bf

and by the way for the purpose of advertisement

what exactly is un scietntifically about it?

you have and hypothesis and you ut it to the test
it would have been completely acceptable in theory in academia

Okay, what is the hypothesis of his experiment then?

"Love does not exist" is not a hypothesis.
"Being-in-love can be induced in a test subject by doing steps a-b-c" could be a test hypothesis (depending on how you conceptionalise it), but it's not a hypothesis he is using for his experiment obviously.

only problem is that ppl are pretty wary of the “love” subject since it affects everyone in someway

Memory does affect everyone (almost all the time) and yet there are thousands of experiments about memory without any issue. In fact, everything in General Psychology does affect everyone (hence the name General Psychology).

Look, I personally agree with Soo-hyun on some level: I too believe that falling/being-in-love is a state-of-mind like any other, that it is just a mix of a certain neurological condition and a hormonal cocktail. And I know that it can be induced in people by external stimuli.

But that doesn't change the fact that he doesn't have a testable hypothesis for his experiment. Okay, let's just say that Soo-hyun's courtship of Hye-rim would work. What would be the result of his experiment? That "love does not exists"? That "love was induced in her by Soo-hyun"? That "woman fall in love with rich men"?

No, the result of his experiment would be that Hye-rim fell in love with Soo-hyun. Scientific value: Zero.

I sure would love a K-drama about a psychological researcher who really tries to do research on being-in-love (unlike many other people here, I guess). But this one simply isn't such a K-drama.

"“Love does not exist” is not a hypothesis.
“Being-in-love can be induced in a test subject by doing steps a-b-c” could be a test hypothesis (depending on how you conceptionalise it), but it’s not a hypothesis he is using for his experiment obviously."

this is his own feeling and actually whenever they talk about it they talk about causes

love is an abstract the whole sentence is in fact incorrect in this sentence it is presented as religion as in "i dont believe in god"

which is completely different then researching what causes and make ppl believe

what makes ppl (women here) fall inlove is very different then a his sentence of his own unrelated beliefe in the existence itself

although i dont believe in god i do know there are religion ppl believe in

unlike love memory and dreams have found a way of becoming culturally helpful ppl are readily volunteer sharin there dreams and memory in a way of getting help to analize them

also memories are helpful mechanism the brain collect your experiences and tells you what you learned from them from your memories

unless it is a really troumatic experience most memories even sad ones looking back makes you reminiscent

memories are no experiences they are the lessons of those experiences

for example when that first woman in the drama will look back on this experience if she is a healthy human she would have a different reaction then the one she has now

memories and dreams have a known therapeutic ability on your mental health

@nara

which is completely different then researching what causes and make ppl believe

what makes ppl (women here) fall inlove is very different then a his sentence of his own unrelated beliefe in the existence itself

But he doesn't do that kind of research.

Can you please tell me what the hypothesis is that he is testing with his experiment?

Because that was never stated in the show; and it definitely isn't derivable from the experiment, which simply consists of seducing Hye-rim in a rather inefficient way.

i dont think there is a god

i meant that he should have said as a scientist i dont think there is love

humans studies always tackle the abstract they dont (hopefully) "believe" in it

his own love thing wasnot part of the experiment reasoning but part of a casual conversation with his student assistant

we dont really see the experiment as it was really made since we see only the end results and some of the last part

he didnt participate and did made a timetable and rules as was said in the first and second ep

but since he wanted to participate - since we know she triggered something in him ths whole experiment is no longer objective and follows the rules
but from this point that drama is trying to prove the opposite than his hypothesis
which is you can fall with anyone if it is done in a specific way according to rules

what the drama is trying to show that love is specific and forever

the show doesnt try to shw the experiment on HR but how it affects and influence CS

while she will have the usual experience he will have a revelation one

it is his point who changing not hers

@nara

unlike love memory and dreams have found a way of becoming culturally helpful

Love is not culturally helpful, as opposed to memory and dreams? I don't follow. Isn't it rather the other way around?

ppl are readily volunteer sharin there dreams and memory in a way of getting help to analize them

Psychological research does not rely on the readiness of test subjects to "share". It cannot, because people have no idea about what's going on in their minds. The introspection inadequacy has been established almost a hundred years ago.

Whether people want to share their experiences or not is mostly irrelevant to psychological research.

memories and dreams have a known therapeutic ability on your mental health

Which is mostly irrelevant to Memory psychology or General psychology. Psychologists do not research memory because of its therapeutic potential, they research it because they want to know how it works.

Clinical psychology then uses that knowledge to "exploit" it for its therapeutic features, but that's the application, not the research.

I still am not sure what you are trying to say here: memory research and emotion research are very similar. It might be a little bit more difficult to find volunteers as test subject in emotion psychology, but in the end, it works just as well.

What do you think is so very different between emotion psychology and memory psychology?
And why and how does this difference effects this show?

i put memory and dreams together since you gave the memories as an example for love, right?

you said that there are experiment on memories without any issues as equivalent for love and therefore added the dreams

since the memories of the days are stored and then manipulated by dreams to make us healthier the next day

clinical memories studies are part of brian research
and i didnt bring it up you did

clinical research always have less social accepting problems than psychological ones since we can discover things that actually make a different to us and not humans and development in general

thats whay i countered it with religion which is much closer to the subject of love and have the same social problems

its hard for me to find the related post so if you dont mind - lets start a new one the next time

not being able to reply specifically is inconvenient

@nara

i dont think there is a god

i meant that he should have said as a scientist i dont think there is love

humans studies always tackle the abstract they dont (hopefully) “believe” in it

(1) Big difference between "love" and "god": Most people have first- or second-hand experiences with effects from "love", but not with "god". "God" is indeed, and almost by definition, solely an entity of belief.

For "love", the question is not whether it exists or not -- it clearly exists -- but what it is and how it works.

"Believing in love" and "believing in god" are two entirely different kinds of "believing"s.

"I don't think there is love" (here: falling/being-in-love) doesn't make much sense. "I think that being/falling-in-love is a derivative of a different, underlying phenomenon." on the other hand would be a rather trivial and universally accepted statement.

his own love thing wasnot part of the experiment reasoning but part of a casual conversation with his student assistant

True.

we dont really see the experiment as it was really made since we see only the end results and some of the last part

he didnt participate and did made a timetable and rules as was said in the first and second ep

Timetable != organised and detailed step-by-step.

True, he haven't seen much of the first experiment, but we have seen him botching the "debriefing" of the test subject and that video he made. Neither met scientific standards in emotion psychology. Not to mention we still don't know what hypothesis this "experiment" was supposed to test.

but from this point that drama is trying to prove the opposite than his hypothesis

which is you can fall with anyone if it is done in a specific way according to rules

Wait, wait, not so fast ...

You mean that this is his hypothesis? Or the opposite of his hypothesis?

His hypothesis is: "You can fall in love with anyone if it (what?) is done in a specific way, according to specific rules."

Meaning that he has a model of how falling in love works and a set of rules how you make a person falling in love.

If he wanted to test this hypothesis, he needed to design an experiment where he tests this hypothesis, don't you agree? Why doesn't he do that? Why does he set up an experiment where three men compete for a woman in an uncontrolled, not timed, mostly random kind of way?
Even before Soo-hyun did start to become heavily biased about Hye-rim, he never gave any instruction to the men in his experiment how to manipulate the supposed test subject. If he wanted to test whether his model for rule-based falling-in-love was correct, he would have tested these rules in the experiment. He didn't. He simply decided to create random, unplanned courtship encounters and didn't care at all about what the other two men did.

(As for...

@11.2.2.1.16 nara

I replied in a separate thread down below (#33).