30d (edited) • ♾ Mindset #Think
The Princeton University “Good Samaritan” Experiment
What happened
Researchers at Princeton conducted a famous psychology study involving seminary students people training to become religious leaders.
Each student was told to walk to another building to give a talk.
Some were told the talk was about job opportunities.
Others were told the talk was about "the Good Samaritan" a story about helping someone in need.
On the way, every student passed a man slumped in a doorway, coughing and appearing to be in distress.
But before leaving, students were given different instructions:
• Some were told: “You’re late. You should hurry.”
• Others were told: **“You have plenty of time.”**
The results:
The students in a hurry mostly walked past the person without helping.
The students who were not rushed were far more likely to stop and assist.
Here’s the striking part:
The topic of their speech even when it was about helping others had *almost no effect*.
Time pressure did.
The deeper lesson
It wasn’t morals that determined action.
It wasn’t knowledge, values, nor intention.
It was *situational friction*.
A small amount of stress and urgency caused a massive drop in compassionate action.
Mindset Insight
People like to believe their actions come from their character.
In reality, behavior is often shaped more by environment and pressure than by beliefs.
When the brain feels rushed, overloaded, or mentally stretched, it shifts into "task mode", and empathy or initiative gets deprioritized.
Connection to Real Life
This same pattern shows up everywhere:
People don’t start investing because
“I’m too busy right now.”
They don’t improve their health because
“Work is crazy these days.”
They don’t build new skills because
“I’ll do it when things calm down.”
But things rarely calm down.
And just like in the experiment, *the moment never feels convenient enough to act*.
Core Takeaway for Investorms
The barrier to action is often not knowledge or morality.
It’s *friction*.
And if you wait for the perfect, low-stress moment to move…
you will wait longer than the opportunity window stays open.
2
0 comments
The Princeton University “Good Samaritan” Experiment
skool.com/investorms
Become a macro analyst 📈
• Master technical analysis
• Execute with precision 🎯
• Decode market myths
Old-fashioned investors are bleeding money 💰
Leaderboard (30-day)
1
+2
2
+1
3
+1
4
+1
Powered by