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Was Zimbardo's Prison Experiment Ethical

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Was Zimbardo’s prison experiment ethical? This experiment was not ethical. Zimbardo’s research resulted in exposing a major dark side of the psychological jurisdiction of human treatment and behavior. When contemplating this experiment, issues of ethics were not observed, in other words this experiment was deemed ethical. However, the question not asked at the time of conception was whether the rights of the actors involved were unacceptably infringed upon. What were the ethical implications that led to Zimbardo’s name being associated with the term “unethical”? The term deception comes to mind. Clearly the American Psychological Association (APA) advises deception may be used when the act of deception is completely unavoidable and a debriefing must follow the experiment (Kuipers, & Hysom, 2014). The APA also recognizes deception must be avoided if there is a realistic opportunity that participants may be subjected to physical pain or severe emotional trauma (Fisher, 2005). Although Zimbardo did not …show more content…

Zimbardo has been criticized about the pressures asserted on the actors to continue in the experiment. Several participants requested to withdraw from the project several times however, Zimbardo discouraged the idea and basically strong armed the participants to proceed with the study (Zimbardo, 1973). The serious unethical allegation in this experiment was Zimbardo’s deliberate misuse of power and the purposeful neglect on the right for the participants to with withdraw when requested to do so. According to the APA, informed consent must inform the participant of potential hazards involved while participating in particular experiments (Kuipers, & Hysom, 2014). Again, Zimbardo and the participants, including the research team had no prior knowledge that the experiment would turn out the way it did. People are unpredictable by nature and to assume they will act in a predictable way can result in failure (Richards,

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