Factors In Abu Ghraib And The Stanford Prison Experiment

In the movie, “A Few Good Men”, two types of reactions are shown in response to being part of a person’s wrongful death. Philip Zimbardo in his work, “The Stanford Prison Experiment”, provides the perspective of the guards who initiated a harsh prison environment and how they reflected upon the experience. Meanwhile a real-life scandal is analyzed by Marianne Szegedy-Maszak in “The Abu Ghraib Prison Scandal: Sources of Sadism”. This piece reviews the actions of soldiers in controversial situations shortly after the infamous 9-11 attacks. Repeating the military topic, Herbert C. Kelman and V. Lee Hamilton addressed Lt. Calley’s steadfast belief that he did no wrong in the Vietnam War scandal in “The My Lai Massacre: A Military Crime of

“Cruelty is all out of ignorance. If you knew what was in store for you, you wouldn’t hurt anybody, because whatever you do comes back much more forceful than you sent it out.” (Willie Nelson). The Stanford Prison Experiment was extremely similar to the concentration camps of the Holocaust in many was however the one think that that makes then similar was the fact that they were both extremely cruel and dehumanized people. Three things that the victims of both events faced are dehumanization, cruelty, and extreme mentally scaring things that they will never forget. Both the concentration camps in the Holocaust and the Stanford Prison Experiment were things that did not go well and were immensely traumatizing.

In “The Abu Ghraib Prison Scandal: Sources of Sadism,” Marianne Szegedy-Maszak informs the reader of the situation United States guards caused against Iraqi detainees. Under Bush’s presidency, United States soldiers brought physical abuse and humiliation upon the Abu Ghraib Prison. Szegedy-Maszak briefly analyzes the situation and compares the abuse to further scientific experiments in which test obedience. One of the experiments was the topic of another article titled, “The Stanford Prison Experiment,” written by Philip G. Zimbardo. In his work, Zimbardo discusses the experiment he held at Stanford University. A group of male students from the university were paid to participate in an experiment held in a mock prison. Half of the group

In the experiment, people were picked randomly and one as a teacher and one as the student. They were told to take a quiz and give electric shocks of increasing intensity as punishment if the student can’t answer. During the experiment, many people were concerned as someone can be heard shouting but only a few people who decided to stop and stick to their morals. But the others kept on going because they were just following orders from a superior (Milgram 77). "The Stanford Prison Experiment” by Philip Zimbardo, is about an experiment that was made to understand the roles people play in prison situations. For the experiment, Zimbardo converted a basement of the Stanford University psychology building into a mock prison. The participants were told to act as prisoners and guards. It was planned to be a two-week experiment but was forced to shut down in 6 days, all because of people quickly getting into their roles and started acting like the real prisoners and guards (Zimbardo 104). To compare both experiments, although they differed vastly in design and methodology, the point of both experiments was to observe how far an individual would go in inflicting increasing pain on a victim. Also how people obey under authoritative circumstances, when given power or different roles, however the writers differ in the seriousness of the fight for individuality and the use of reality.

“That line between good and evil is permeable,” a psychologist from Stanford University by the name of Zimbardo once said. “Any of us can move across it… I argue that we all have the capacity for love and evil — to be Mother Theresa, to be Hitler or Saddam Hussein” (qtd. In Dittmann). Social psychologist Zimbardo implies that we can easily swap from side to side. What factors elicit darkness? What draws out the darkness, making us jump from good to bad? There are many views in the society that attempt to tackle this question. For instance, social psychology and philosophy. Social psychology tends to side with situation and or authority. On the other hand, philosopher John Locke is certain that the accumulation of experiences is the cause. What is the ultimate answer?

citizens, but it was the researchers afterwards that contributed the most startling idea. Zimbardo, the same man who ran the Stanford Prison Experiment, said in an interview with the New York Times, “Prisons tend to be brutal and abusive places unless great effort is made to control the guards’ base impulses. It’s not that we put bad apples in a good barrel. We put good apples in a bad barrel. The barrel corrupts anything that it touches” (Swhwartz, 2004 p. 2). A professor of Law at Loyola University, Marcy Strauss, studies criminal procedure and wrote a forty-two page manuscript on the lessons that should be discussed beyond news articles. Strauss said of Abu Ghraib, “Undoubtedly, these factors [poor training of guards, poor oversight and horrendous conditions] played a major role in facilitating the abuse. Correcting these conditions is imperative. But, to end the introspection there would be a mistake” (Strauss, 2005 p.9). The idea that people could be malignant under specific circumstances has been proven by Milgrams’ studies and this idea is now apparent in real life. Thus, the concern for prisons, as pointed out by both Zimbardo and Strauss, cannot simply be that the guards or correctional officers do not abuse people in the future. The issue is that the maltreatment and indignity in Abu Ghraib was a result of the poor foundation of the U.S. correctional system (Strauss,

In this paper I will illustrate how the lessons learned from the Stanford Experiment apply to understanding the dynamics of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib. The Stanford Experiment demonstrates how social influence can persuade one’s behavior and shape their conformity. The experiment and the prisoner abuse in Abu Ghraib exemplify the power of authority by utilizing their positions and uniforms to control and overrule the prisoners.

The Abu Ghraib torture scandal left a large blemish on the occupation of Iraq and George Bush’s War on terror. As stories of the torture happening in the Abu Ghraib prison began circulating, American citizens had trouble comprehending the acts of evil their soldiers had committed on Iraqis. Some began to see a correlation between Abu Ghraib and the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment. Though the guards in both situations were brutal to their captives, distinct differences lay in the severity of their actions. Abu Ghraib’s guards were much more vicious to their captives, and this can be attributed to the prejudices the guards felt against their captors, the environment, and the lack of training, compounded with a lack of accountability in the leadership.

She begins recounting the notorious details, how innocent college students labeled prisoners and guards displayed psychological abuse after only six days of confinement, and makes reference to Stanley Milgram’s obedience study and Abu Ghraib, where similar maltreatment, perceived or real, was conducted on civilians by civilians. She addresses and refutes the accepted belief that the Stanford Prison Experiment proved that anyone could become a tyrant when given or instructed by a source of authority. Instead, she suggests that Zimbardo’s inquiry points toward but does not land on one exact conclusion. She explains the influence of the setting, the presentation of the roles, Zimbardo’s participation, and perhaps a sense of expectation felt, all of which can be reflected in the shocking behavior of a few guards. She argues that it should not have been so shocking. Konnikova discredits the neutrality of Zimbardo’s experiment by insisting that people who would respond to an ad for a psychological study of prison life were not “normal” people. However, with her diction and choice of evidence she displaces the study's culpability in a way that ultimately blurs and undermines her claim.

There are many similarities between the behavior of the wardens in Stanford Prison Experiment and the behavior of the soldiers at the prison in Abu Ghraib. I think the first and most obvious comparison would be the blatant misuse and abuse of power. In both instances the figures in authority were aware of their ability to make demands that their subordinates had to comply with, and they took full advantage of it.

The Stanford Prison Experiment was to determine how conformity and obedience could result in people behaving in ways that are counter to how they would at on their own. The main goal of the experiment was to see how social norms and social convections might influence the behavior of participants who are playing the roles of prisoners and prison guards. The study really elaborates on the relationship between the abuser and the abused. It is interesting to see how easily the human psyche gives repetitive abuse and is conditioned to receive it and accept it. This paper will discuss the motives, procedures, findings, ethical issues, and informed consent the Stanford Prison Experiment concluded on.

This has it include a wide range of human existence. On the other side, Stanford experiment shows that tyranny is the major course of all the humiliation that the prisoners underwent and advocates for good planning in the psychological departments where those who are assigned specific roles should be familiarized with their duties through training and making them specialize in their specific

The Stanford prison experiment was unique because they wanted to watch and learn the behaviors of a prisoner and a prison guard, observing the effects they found some pretty disturbing things among the students. Dr. Philip Zimbardo and his colleagues at Stanford University stayed true to what they believed, and they did what they felt they needed to do to find a set of results for their simulation. Unfortunately they where swallowed into the experiment, when they became the roles, just as the students where. So from their point of view I want to say that what they where doing was ethical, and being that the prison experiment was stopped before its half way mark showed that they realized that it was time to call it quits. Dr. Zimbardo noticed

In 2008, Iraq Memory Foundation founder Kanan Makiya said in an interview with the Washington Post, “The U.S. has not committed atrocities in Iraq that are even remotely comparable to what Saddam did.” A prolific writer on Saddam Hussein’s regime and an Iraqi himself, Makiya has written extensively on the power of violence and fear in modern Iraq. This paper argues the enduring legacy of violence within Iraq left by Saddam Hussein’s regime, specifically referencing his human rights abuses at Abu Ghraib prison. In an attempt to fully examine the rise and continuation of institutional torture within Iraq, this paper will explore the building of Abu Ghraib prison in the late 1960s, and subsequently examine Saddam Hussein’s rise to power beginning with his joining of the Ba’athist party in 1956. Following the introductory historical background begins an examination of the effects of, and responses to, Saddam’s human rights abuses during his reign. The final portion of this paper examines the U.S’s use of torture within Iraq, and human rights violations following Saddam Hussein execution in 2006, concluding with final remarks on the state of Abu Ghraib prison today and what it represents for the future.

This report on the Stanford Prison Experiment will define the ethical issues related to prisoner treatment and prison culture in a mock scenario created 1971. The findings of this study define the inclination towards corruption and riotous behavior within the overarching relationship between guard and the prisoners. In a short period of time,. The prisoners became hostile and sought to start a riot in order to free themselves from abuses of the prison guards. In some instances, the issue of role-playing limited to reality of the event, but the ethical issues related to issue of prison corruption became evident in the study. The Stanford Prison Experiment provided some important aspects on how good people can became violent lawbreakers within the orison system. In essence, the ethical and experimental conditions of the Stanford Prison experiment define the corrupting culture of prisons in American society during the early 1970s.