Analysis Of Dr. Zimbardo: The Stanford Prison Experiment

Drs. Milgram and Zimbardo both made groundbreaking discoveries in their field and led people forward based on this knowledge. Both studies originally, in thought, started out to be ethical but the way the experimenters went about the treatment of those being tested was unethical due to the mental stresses put on by both experiments. The physical humiliation the participants were put through in the Stanford Prison experiment was uncalled for. It was not right to trade the suffering experienced by participants for knowledge gained because these people are left with physiological damage because of how they were treated. In Milgram’s experiment they all believed they were shocking a man with a heart condition which brought undue stress to the teacher, but they weren’t doing any actual damage to him. In the Stanford Prison experiment the prisoners were belittled and shamed and made to feel like actual prisoners. One prisoner went on hunger strike and refused to eat unless released. The hunger strike and most of the guard’s emotional attacks caused major psychological scars and emotional damage. This is what many people actually experience when they come out of prison.

The experimental study that I chose to write about is the Stanford Prison Experiment, which was run by Phillip Zimbardo. More than seventy applicants answered an ad looking for volunteers to participate in a study that tested the physiological effects of prison life. The volunteers were all given interviews and personality tests. The study was left with twenty-four male college students. For the experiment, eighteen volunteers took part, with the other volunteers being on call. The volunteers were then divided into two groups, guards and prisoners, randomly assigned by coin flips. The experiment began on August 14th, 1971 in the basement of Stanford’s psychology building. To create the prison cells for the prisoners, the doors were taken

The Stanford Prison Experiment was very strange. When one of the prisoners said “they were out of control,” I thought about an authoritarian leader- someone that controls every aspect of a person’s life. I think Zimbardo, creator of the Stanford Prison Experiment, and the guards were being an authoritarian leader. I thought it was disturbing that some of the people that were given the guards position only said “yes” to participate in the experiment because they needed a job and thought that the Prison Experiment would be more entertaining. I think it was weird that being in this experiment changed the “prisoners” physically and mentally. In the Stanford Prison Experiment video, it mentioned the electric shock experiment that was done to people

The research had felt ‘real’ to them. One guard said ‘I was surprised at myself. I made them call each other names and clean out the toilets with their bare hands. I practically considered the prisoners cattle and I kept thinking I had to watch out for them in case they tried something.’ Another guard said ‘Acting authority can be fun. Power can be a great pleasure.’ And another… during the inspection I went to Cell Two to mess up a bed which a prisoner had just made and he grabbed me, screaming that he had just made it and that he was not going to let me mess it up. He grabbed me by the throat and although he was laughing I was pretty scared. I lashed out with my stick and hit him on the chin although not very hard, and when I freed myself I became angry.” So therefore all of these people testing the experiment they have found out why the prisoners and guards hated each other and this proves why power can corrupt people's

The Zimbardo prison experiment was a study of human responses to captivity, dehumanization and its effects on the behavior on authority figures and inmates in prison situations. Conducted in 1971 the experiment was led by Phlilip Zimbardo. Volunteer College students played the roles of both guards and prisoners living in a simulated prison setting in the basement of the Stanford psychology building.

The Stanford Prison Experiment is a very thought-provoking topic discussed in various classes. Professor and psychologist Philip Zimbardo conducted this experiment through Stanford University. Twenty-four men were randomly selected to participate in a simulated prison environment and were given roles as prisoners or prison guards. This was done to challenge the moral compass of “good” individuals in a negative environment, which in this case was a prison. Surprisingly, the participants truly embodied their roles. Throughout the experiment, the prison guards enforced their authoritarian power and tormented the prisoners both

Before watching this video and discussing it in class I never heard of the Stanford University Prison Experiment. I don’t think this experiment was very ethic due to the gruesome treatment that went on over thirty years ago in the basement of this university. In 1971 Dr. Philp Zimbardo a former sociologist at Stanford created a mock prison to do an unethical experiment. He wanted to test the power of a cruel environment without clear rules to change and transform “normal” people in a prison life experiment. In 2003 in Abu Ghraib, Iraq military enforcement tortured and beat people that did not want to follow the strict directions given to them. No one of ever knew about the treatment against these people if it was not pictures of proof to help

By limiting the individuality of the prisoners within the Stanford Prison Experiment, prisoners quickly conformed to their roles. They depended on guards

All of the participants were selected from the students who got 15 dollars per day and passed the test without any mental illness. The roles they were playing as the prisoner or the guard were picked randomly. Prof Zimbardo also played a role as an administrator of the prison. Before starting the experiment, he gave a brief orientation to all of the guards that were the maintenance of disciplines and forbiddance the use of physical violence. He reminded the guards once a prison escaped from the cell, the experiment was terminated. He also emphasized that the guards and the administrator had the constant super power during the experiment but the prisoners had none. All of the students who were playing the roles of prisoners were folded their eyes and brought them walking into the basement, in order to confuse their locations. When they entered into the prison, they were peeled off and put on a prison’s clothes, made fun with their genitals, put stocking to cover their head. According to Prof Zimbardo, it was the degradation process which was also processed in the military type. It was the first day of the

This experiment affected the prisoners' mindsets and their attitudes. This study also had affected the guard’s behavior. Before the experiment had begun, each subject had been gone through a series of psychological tests to narrow the subjects down to those who were completely ordinary and had no signs of previous mental illnesses. The students in the experiment had changed to conform their social roles in the mock prison. The prisoners had changed to an obedient, following state of mind while the guards had begun to act violently and with aggressive attitudes.

Essay #2 The influence someone can have on the behavior of another is not tangible it’s difficult to pinpoint to something physical and is problematic to attempt to duplicate and experiment on which in some cases could border on the inhumane. The Stanford Prison Experiment is a fascinating example in which an observation of human behavior took an unexpected turn which questioned the true morality of the participants. The conclusions had far reaching implications about human behavior and about the natural and inherent lack of morality observed in everyday people when placed in certain situations. The behavior of every single participant had been affected and changed during the course of the experiment.

They experiment was suppose to run for fourteen days but only lasted a mere six days. Five prisoners had to leave early due to the participants breaking down emotionally. Everyone, even Philip Zimbardo himself, fell deeply into their assign positions (The Stanford Prison Experiment, Zimbardo). Problem/Purpose

Zimbardo’s (1971) Stanford’s prison experiment concluded that people will readily conform to the social roles they are expected to play, especially if the roles are as strongly stereotyped as those of the prison guards. However, the study has received many ethical criticisms including the lack of informed consent from participants, as even Zimbardo did not know what was going to happen within the experiment. The participants playing the role of prisoners were not protected from psychological harm, experiencing incidents of humiliation and distress. As an example, a prisoner had to be released after 36 hours due to uncontrollable bursts of screaming, crying and anger.

In 1971, Stanford University conducted an experiment known as The Stanford Prison Experiment. The aim of the experiment was to place college students in positions of guard and prisoners in a role-playing exercise stimulating prison life. More than 70 “applicants” answered the ad and then were given “diagnostic interviews” to eliminate candidates with psychological problems, mental disabilities, and/or history of crime or drug abuse. Out of the 70 who had applied, they were left with 24 college students from the United States and Canada who were in the Stanford Area wanting to earn $15 a day participating in this study. Randomly divided by a coin toss, these men were placed into their positions.

In 1971 Philip Zimbardo conducted the Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) in the basement of Stanford University as a mock prison. Zimbardo’s aim was to examine the effect of roles, to see what happens when you put good people in an evil place and to see how this effects tyranny. He needed participants to be either ‘prisoners’ or ‘guards’ and recruited them through an advertisement, 75 male college students responded and 24 healthy males were chosen and were randomly allocated roles. Zimbardo wanted to encourage deindividuation by giving participants different uniforms and different living conditions (the guards had luxuries and the prisoners were living as real prisoners). The guards quickly began acting authoritarian, being aggressive towards the prisoners and giving them punishments causing physical and emotional breakdowns. Zimbardo’s intention was for his study to last for 2 weeks, however, it