Harvard experiment on teen Kaczynski may have shaped Unabomber crimes: expert

In the years before Ted Kaczynski became synonymous with his nickname as the “Unabomber,” he was tapped to conduct an intense psychological experiment that left experts scratching their heads about its possible impact on his nearly two-decade career. As a notorious criminal.

Kaczynski was only 16 years old when he entered university Harvard University In 1958, it was a turning point in the teenager’s life. However, he was selected at the prestigious university to participate in a three-year psychological study that may have changed the course of his life.

After investigators revealed that Kaczynski was the mastermind behind a series of bombings that killed three people and injured 23 others, they focused their attention on experiments conducted by psychologist Henry A. Murray focuses on an impressionable teenager who studies at Harvard University. according to History.com.

“[Kaczynski] “He was very vulnerable because of his age and everything,” Dr. Anne Wolbert Burgess, lead of the FBI’s Behavioral Sciences Unit, told Fox News Digital. “So I think that will affect him.” “I think that affected him.”

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Theodore “Ted” Kaczynski is surrounded by federal agents as he is led into a car from the federal courthouse in Helena, Montana on April 4, 1996. (AP Photo/John Youngbear, File)

At the time, Murray reportedly recruited 22 students to participate in his program Research into the human psyche – A popular point of interest during the Cold War. The group of Ivy Leaguers were assigned to write a comprehensive essay detailing their personal philosophies, beliefs, and worldviews in the first part of the study.

However, the experience quickly escalated.

Once each student submits their essay, they are hooked up to electrodes and seated in front of bright lights, according to History.com. Murray would then reportedly ask his team to belittle each student’s ideals, subjecting them to what he described as “violent, sweeping and personally offensive” interrogations.

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Screenshot showing the high school yearbook photo of Ted Kaczynski of Evergreen, Illinois in 1958. (WBBM-TV/AFP via Getty Images)

Murray reportedly did not fully brief participants on the nature of the experiment, which was intended to study useful interrogation techniques that could be used by national security agents and other law enforcement officials while in the field.

“It was clearly unethical to do research and not tell people, especially to do research where they were hooked up to electrodes,” Burgess said. “I mean I understand now what they were trying to do to see if the heart rate and blood pressure and all that would go up. So they took some measures — some tough measures — but obviously that was allowed at Harvard and the way Murray played, that was a good thing.”

Burgess also added that Murray was not treating his subjects fairly while they were undergoing the experiment, ultimately violating a series of modern ethical standards.

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Ted Kaczynski stands outdoors at UC Berkeley, in June 1968. (Sigma/Sigma via Getty Images)

“One of the key points is that you can’t do research that doesn’t compensate the person in some way,” Burgess told Fox News Digital. “You don’t have to pay them, but you can compensate them in some other way — so that should always be part of the exchange.”

However, Murray’s research did not violate any governing codes of conduct Psychological research At that time, according to History.com. His studies reportedly fall under Nuremberg Code of Research EthicsThese are non-legally binding standards that were established at the end of World War II at the Nuremberg Trials.

Although there were no ethical barriers, Burgess insists that the public nature of the experiment was harmful to its participants.

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Ted Kaczynski is escorted by armed US Marshals outside a federal courthouse in Sacramento, California on January 8, 1998. (Rich Pedroncelli/AFP via Getty Images)

“[Studies] “It can’t be harmful. You’re not there to be hurt, and what Murray and his crew were doing certainly was harmful,” Burgess said.

“Calling them derogatory names or saying their work wasn’t worthwhile — these were students. Their whole being, at that particular stage of their development, was academics and knowledge. They were belittled because of that, or devalued because of that at this critical time.”

Harvard University did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

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Ted Kaczynski sits and smiles during an interview in the visiting room at the ADX Supermax federal prison in Florence, Colorado on August 30, 1999. (Stephen J. Dubner/Getty Images)

While investigators were working to uncover Kaczynski’s life, his arrest led to… Murray’s professional reputation It is marred by details of unconventional experiments conducted three decades ago. However, despite Murray’s death in 1988, his research is said to still be prevalent in modern psychological examinations.

Kaczynski was later He was diagnosed with schizophreniaIn 1998, he pleaded guilty to charges stemming from his 17-year bombing spree. He died inside his cell at the Federal Penitentiary Medical Center in Butner, North Carolina, in 2023, in what was ultimately ruled a suicide. according to Associated Press.

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However, the question of whether Murray’s extensive experiments on Kaczynski aggravated his mental condition in a way that led him to commit nearly… Two decades of heinous crimes It remains unanswered, with experts left to only speculate about the long-term effects of the study on such a fragile young mind.

“Did any of this affect him?” Burgess said. “Clearly his defense attorneys at his trial wanted to make the argument that this influenced his thinking — and it could have.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.