A GROUP of five-year-old’s are challenged to see if they’ll cheat in the age old test which checks whether kids stick to the rules once adults have left the room.
The youngsters’ sense of right and wrong is put to the test as Channel 4’s hit documentary The Secret Life of Five-Year-Olds returns.
The show, which captures the daily antics at a nursery via hidden cameras, returns for a new two part series.
In it the moral compass of six children is tested in a game which sees them win jelly beans.
In three pairs of two, the kids roll a dice each, and if they hit double six are rewarded with a sweet.
And they all stick to the rules – until the teacher leaves the room.
But with no adult supervision, it doesn’t take long before the duos start bending the rules.
Predictably, the children decide that getting sweets is the most important thing, and it only takes the first two, Luke H and Luke B, 90 seconds before the rulebook is thrown out the window.
Luke H is the main culprit, who manages the sway Luke B into skirting the rules, and the pair finish with nine jelly beans.
Once left unsupervised the next pair, Elsa and Iris, stick to the rules for more than two minutes, but they too cheat and end up with seven jelly beans.
This is despite Elsa saying cheating was “bad manners”.
The third group, Jasmin and Ella, take their cheating to the next level.
After a mere 44 seconds, Jasmin starts picking up the dice and picking sixes, telling the camera “I like cheating”.
Despite her protestations, Ella soon joins in, and when the results are counted it’s clear the pair didn’t do their cheating by half.
The girls racked an incredible 70 beans, causing the others to smell a rat – despite everyone cheating.
Elsa voiced her suspicions, saying: “It is making me think that I am not believing them, really it’s impossible to get that many jelly beans in that time.”
In an interesting twist, Jasmin tries to share out the beans as if making up for them cheating, and she admits: “We cheated just one time.”
Educational Neuroscientist Prof. Paul Howard-Jones told : “What’s been fascinating here is that all the children here have been guilty of foul play, but after a moral debate it’s Ella and Jasmin that have been found to be most accountable.
“Consensus and discussion is really critical for us as adults when we’re setting our moral compass but we can see even at five years old there is a valuing of that common agreement.”
The new show airs on Tuesday May 9 on Channel 4 at 8pm.
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