The Real Lesson Of The Stanford Prison Experiment Summary

“The Stanford Prison Experiment” by Philip G. Zimbardo was written to explain the results of the Stanford prison experiment. Zimbardo while trying to gain support for his conclusions of the experiment, demonstrated many errors in his writing, and in his own experiment. The errors that Zimbardo commits call into question the validity of his argument, and the experiment. The goal explained by Zimbardo was “to understand more about the process by such people called “prisoners” lose their liberty, civil rights, independence, and privacy, while those called “guards” gain social power by accepting the responsibility for controlling and managing the lives of their dependent charges” (Zimbardo 733).

Gladwell strategically uses the Zimbardo Prison Experiment, because this shows that with the two previous cases that the possibility of the subject being a criminal was eliminated. This experiment shows that even educated Stanford students in a monitored and controlled atmosphere are at the mercy of the social context around them. In the Zimbardo six days in because of the effect it was having on the prisoners. “I realize now,” one prisoner said after the experiment was over, “that no matter how together I thought I was in my head, my prison behavior was often less under my control than I realized” (296). This study shows that under a controlled atmosphere that educated Stanford students are not greater than the social context around them. Unlike in the first two examples the Stanford experiment was more inclusive and showed that anyone even highly educated non criminals could have their behaviors altered by mere contextual

The Stanford prison experiment (SPE) was study organized by Philip George Zimbardo who was a professor at Stanford University. Basically, SPE was a study of psychological effect. He studied about how personality and environment of a person effect his behaviour. Experiment he performed was based on prison and life of guards. He wants to find out whether personality get innovated in person according to given environment (situational) or due to their vicious personalities that is violent behaviour (dispositional). The place where the whole experiment was set up Philip Zimbardo and his team was Stanford University on August 14Th to August 20th in the year 1971 (Wikipedia).

In 1971 Philip Zimbardo and his collages Craig Haney, Curtis Banks, David Jaffe, and ex-convict consultant, Carlo Prescott formulated a social experiment that addressed the underlying and basic physical mechanisms of human aggression (Henry, Banks, and Zimbardo, 1973). The experiment was planned to last two weeks and consist of male college students. The study was based upon the dynamic of the authority of prison guards and submissive behavior of the prisons inmates. Therefore, the experiment required for a mock prison to be built.

In the article Revisiting the Stanford Prison Experiment: A Lesson in the Power of Situation Professor Philip Zimbardo claims that “the situation and the system creating it also must share in the responsibility for illegal and immoral behavior” when deciding an individual’s criminal accountability. Because the power of a situation has an enormous influencing effect on not only the subject, but the people around the situation and that dynamics in military detainment operations carry immediate risks of mistreatment and power abuse. Good people can do very bad things when in a bad situation. Zimbardo starts off his article for the Chronicle of Higher Education with several different social experiments that have been done. After explaining these studies he recalls his own experiment, the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment. Zimbardo shares these studies as a cautionary tale and for the audience to reflect on our justice system in regards to imprisonment. Due to Zimbardo’s various appeals to pathos and logos and the methods he used, the argument that he makes about the justice system is effective and relevant.

In the documentary Quiet Rage, the story of Zimbardo’s prison experiment is retold. In the documentary, Zimbardo develops a hypothesis that the abusive behaviors in prison is either caused by pre-existing personality traits of the inmates and guards, or the prison environment itself is the cause. He tested his hypothesis by carefully selecting 24 physically healthy, and mentally stable, male college students to participate in a “mock prison” experiment. The basement of Stanford’s psychology department was used to recreate a prison environment, complete with cells, a prison yard, Warden and Superintendent’s offices, and solitary confinement. Half of the test subjects were randomly selected to be prisoner, and the other half to be guards. They were to be placed in the environment, and their roles, for two weeks, and to be carefully observed by Zimbardo who also acted as the prison superintendent. Zimbardo planned to observe the affects the prison environment had the subjects. Due to the extremely abusive characteristics guards developed, and the swift decline of

The Stanford Prison Experiment was a study conducted by Phillip Zimbardo to better understand how people will react if put into an evil setting, and if we as humans, would allow it to consume us, or overcome it with our moral values and obligations. 24 participants were selected to participate out of the 70 volunteers. Before the experiment began, Zimbardo randomly selected students, either as “Prison Guards” or “Prisoners”. Zimbardo expected it to be a boring study that would last one to two weeks, but soon realized he would need to end the experiment within six days.

The participants in the “Zimbardo Prison study” had several negative effects. The prisoners suffered mental breakdowns in which they began crying, yelling, and screaming. The guards were consumed in their power and had no compassion for the prisoners in which they stripped, beat, and dehumanized them. The experiment was supposed to last for 14 days but only lasted for six because of the severe effects the prisoners were experiencing. Zimbardo became too involved in the experiment and was not making appropriate decisions to protect those involved in the experiment. The guards were too immersed in their power roles to realize they were hurting the prisoners. Zimbardo’s honesty was compromised and was not of an appropriate experiment conductor. The mental effects of

The Stanford Prison experiment was conducted by Philip Zimbardo and his associates, David Jaffe, Craig Haney, Curtis Banks and Carlo Prescott. The experiment began in 1971 and was located in the Stanford Psychology department’s basement, converted into a makeshift simulated prison able to hold 24 male participants who were interviewed and randomly sorted into guard and prisoner roles (McLeod). The experiment was initially conducted to further understand “interpersonal dynamics in a simulated prison” (Haney, Banks, Zimbardo) meaning the way individual persons react

The Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted by a research group led by Dr. Philip Zimbardo using Stanford students during August 14 through the 20th of 1971. Dr. Zimbardo wanted to see how people reacted when they are either put in captivity or in charge of others. The study was funded by the US Office of Naval Research and grew interest to both the US Navy and the Marine Corps for an investigation to the purpose of conflict among military guards and prisoners. In the study, 24 male students were selected out of 75 applicants to take on randomly assigned roles. One of the surprises of the study was how participants quickly adapted to roles well beyond expectations. After the first eight hours, the experiment turned to be a joke and nobody was taking it seriously but then prisoners

In 1971, Dr. Zimbardo as a young psychologist at Stanford University, CA conducted an experiment on prison behavior where normal, run of the mill liberal undergraduate students volunteers were divided into two groups, ‘prisoners’ and ‘guards’. Even though students knew, that it was an artificial situation, the guards, assumed a sense of power and tormented, tortured and sexually humiliated their prisoners regardless of the fact that they knew that the prisoners had done no wrong. The prisoners were brainwashed into a role of helplessness, dejection and acceptance of their faith. Zimbardo and his colleagues got so carried away with how well the experiment was turning out, that he did nothing to stop it! They had all lost their moral compass in this situation!

In 1971 the professor of psychology at Stanford conducted with the help of a group of students, the now well known, and sometimes even defined as infamous; the Stanford Prison Experiment. Professor’s Zimbardo’s experiment have given us a unique insight into human psyche; namely, how social roles can influence our behavior. At one point the experiment apparently got out of control, but the results are non the less astounding; it gives us reasons to believe, that when an individual is provided with legitimizing ideology, or institutional support, we might witness degeneration and breakdown of established morals and social rules. The experiment has as many proponents, as it has opponents; and there is no doubt, that it had some negative impact

The Zimbardo (1971) study was an intense demonstration of the affects that prison can have on people. As I read I was shocked over many of the aspects of the study and concerned with the consequences the study may have. Lack of training for the guards and their control that they would have over the prisoners was what I thought was the first mistake of the experiment. Throughout the study, I continued to asked myself, what if a guard takes it too far will there be consequences? What should be considered too far since there were no direct rules established for the guards? While reading, I felt anticipation of what was going to be the outcome, fearing for the prisoners. The simulation of the uniform, chain, and stocking were appropriate in creating

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.

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