To be purgatory's advocate,
The Jumbo cabin (I'm supposing we're talking about a 747 or a 777 or an equal sized plane, would have to be at actual altitude, and flying, to get the same effect as a real explosion/hull breach scenario. I have a feeling that it was the Transportation industry trying to put ease to a very scary scenario.
When a plane is static on the ground, pressurized as it would be at altitude, it is just a pressure filled tube in a slightly less dense atmosphere. Also, it isn't under the constant barrage of a kabatic-style slipstream. I can tell you that a 747/777/Airbus is a strong, venerably rigid structure, even for a partially stressed-skin aircraft. However, if it's flying at 40,000 feet, the conditions are far from the test conditions. There is very, very, very little air pressure. Without the special alloys used in its monocoque rings, the plane would be very prone to coming apart in major stress loaded areas, from the strain of containing a barely less than sea-level barometric pressure in such a void atmosphere, let alone an explosive incident.
This, combined with a laminar air flow slipping relatively unobstructed over the outside surface, makes for an even lower air pressure pulling on the skin of the craft once the nose of the plane has plowed its way through the thin, but resistant, air mass. I'm sure you've cracked, or partially rolled down a window, while driving on the highway. You get that flutter of buffeting wind on the trailing side of the window frame, and a oscillating drop in pressure inside the car. One typically has to equalize to the sudden drop. You're probably only going about 70 mph, and the car's aerodynamics were designed where it will cause the least amount of discomfort for windows-down driving at such speeds.
In large transport aircraft, the air pressure wants to equalize by whatever means necessary. And you're now going on average 530 to 580 mph. At an altitude of even 35,000, if there were even a small stress related failure, or perhaps a shoe-bomb related explosion (I think it's quiet bizarre that shoe-bomb is now a society-accepted term), The relatively dense pressure would open whatever hole to a good size. The enlarged breach, in collaberation with the windspeed peeling back more of the the outwardly shredded hide of the aircraft, almost instantly would create such a forcefull equalization, that I can easily imagine some of the adjoining seats, floor surface, carry-on compartments, and various electrical systems being ripped like weed roots from the point of hull failure...as it's happened in several (non-explosive incidences) before.
Now, for the sake of the cigarette lighter experiment, I'd have to put my money on the airplane's resilience...unless perhaps a malicious person were to remember place the overheating lighter between the hull of the plane and a non-shock-absorbing item, such as a metal briefcase. This would give the relatively small blast some "oomph". Remember that dynamite doesn't do all that much, unless it's strapped tight against something, and does even more damage if it's tucked inside a dense mass....like dropping a quarter stick inside a hole drilled in quarry rock.
In summary, there aren't that many bad people out there, but it only takes one to give everyone a crappy time from then on. As far as an explosion in a "test" experiment goes, the plane is pretty tough. But given real conditions, there is a lot of almost-chaotic conditions for something to go really wrong. Companies build planes for comfort and durability, not terrorists. Plane safety isn't determined by the grace of God or Gods. A lighter isn't much of a weapon, unless used to the best of its advantage, which isn't an easy task sneakily execute.
I worry more about a malcontent chemist giving a no-goodnick a large, precisely timed chemically detonated, household-chemical bomb to store in the bay of an airliner.
Sorry for being so wordy and grim.
