What Are The Implications Of The Stanford Prison Experiment

Most individuals with authority will likely abuse their power. Such as demonstrated in the Stanford Prison experiment, where participants played the role of guards and prison in a mock-prison. This experiment was supposed to last two weeks but only lasted six days because the guards were buying abusive and the prisoners became anxious and highly stressed. Also, in this experiment, the man who conducted this experiment lost side track of the purpose of the experiment and that it is not an actual prison. Although, the experiment was just an experiment, the individuals who were the guards loss awareness of that and abuse their positions as guards. These individuals we don’t know how their characteristics, nor their personalities. We know they comply their behavior to fit the role of a guard. We can see this in the Flint water crisis since the people in positions that they need to protect the well- being of their people just as the guards who purpose is to maintain order in the prison not abuse the prisoners. We assume people in authority didn’t want to harm any individuals purposely. People with positions with authority, such as the governor of the state didn’t want to say one of the city

The Stanford Prison Experiment was a clear example of how humans can adapt to specific social roles and behave differently under the pressure of control. The experiment illustrated the concepts of deviance and social control through participants behavior. Although the prisoners were not really prisoners, they believed that they were. The behavior of the prisoners began to morph along with the experiment. By day two, the prisoners were showing deviance by barricading themselves inside their cells. The environment and treatment of the prisoners were likely causes of the disobedience. Similarly, the guards showed signs of social control throughout the experiment. Guards were able to show control over the prisoners through various actions, such

When put into the position of complete authority over others people will show their true colors. I think that most people would like to think that they would be fair, ethical superiors. I know I would, but learning about the Stanford Prison Experiment has made me question what would really happen if I was there. Would I be the submissive prisoner, the sadistic guard, or would I stay true to myself? As Phillip Zimbardo gave the guards their whistles and billy clubs they drastically changed without even realizing it. In order to further understand the Stanford Prison experiment I learned how the experiment was conducted, thought about the ethical quality of this experiment, and why I think it panned out how it did.

“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?

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 Maria Konnikova’s “The Real Lesson of the Stanford Prison Experiment” she reveals what she believes to be the reality of sociologist Philip Zimbardo’s controversial study: its participants were not “regular” people.

The article on the Stanford Prison Experiment titled, A Study of Prisoners and Guards in a Simulated Prison and written by the Office of Naval Research, provides us with the overall information that deals with this controversial psychological study. The study was conducted by

Philip (2009) to try and see what was being said about prison treatment was true, this was called the Stanford prison experiment. This experiment only lasted 6 days due to the circumstances versus 6 weeks. Zimbardo had to find out whether the prisons were brutal due to the guards or due to the environment. It was clear that the role of the guards was the issue and not the environment. This was discovered when a sample was chosen from the population. Each induvial was set up to be a guard or a prisoner at random. In this study researchers got see the unfortunate power of social situations. Once prisoner and guard roles were assigned each group were told that they were being watched by the researcher and his colleagues, the guards were to not hit the prisoners, and debriefed about the experiment. Although all this was told the guards took situations into their own hands and the power took over. The guards began simply viewing them as prisoners and the prisoners began to fear the guards. It is important to note the researcher did not intervene but continued to observe when the hitting was taking place. This is particularly important because not only are the guards fitting the rod but the researcher is at fault for the fundamental attribution error but viewing the situation for what it

In 1971, psychologist Philip Zimbardo and his colleagues created the experiment known as the Stanford Prison Experiment. Zimbardo wanted to investigate further into human behavior, so he created this experiment that looked at the impact of taking the role of a prisoner or prison guard. These researchers examined how the participants would react when placed in an institutionalized prison environment. They set up a mock prison in the basement of Stanford University’s psychology building. Twenty four undergraduate students were selected to play the roles of both prisoners and guards. These students were chosen because they were emotional, physically, and mentally stable. Though the experiment was expected to last two weeks, it only lasted six days after the researchers and participants became aware of the harm that was being done.

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

I will begin by explaining why the Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted. Dr. Philip Zimbardo and his research team sought to examine the effect that social institutions and certain situations have on an individual’s behavior. According to the American Psychological Association, a situation-centered approach to studying human behavior, “focuses on factors external to the person” (American Psychological Association). More specifically, Zimbardo wanted to study how quickly an individual would conform to the role of prisoner or

The Stanford prison experiment was a milestone study. Led by Philip Zimbardo, volunteers played the roles of guard and prisoner, and lived in a mock prison. Although the duration of the experiment was half of what was expected, the experiment highlights the “impressionability and obedience of people with a legitimizing ideology”. Zimbardo specifically set up conditions to trigger disorientation of the participants.

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

This paper serves to summarize The Zimbardo Prison Experiment, better known as The Stanford Prison Experiment which was conducted by Phillip Zimbardo in 1971 at Stanford University. The purpose of the study was to conduct research in order to better understand the psychological components of human aggression and submission to include conformity and obedience in a prison environment with a select group of subjects playing roles as either prison guards or inmates, however, I should note, according to McLeod, S. (2016), The Navy’s intent or purpose for the experiment was to better understand how to train members of the armed forces on how to cope with stress associated with captivity as opposed to making American Prison systems more humane. Another interesting point of note is that Zimbardo conducted this experiment shortly after World War II, and the Vietnam War where concern was raised as to some of the atrocities carried out in those wars where “ordinary” people conducted heinous acts per instruction from so-called authoritative figures. Experiments with similar objectives were carried out by Stanley Milgram and others. (Jones, A. D., & Milgram, S. 1974)

The Stanford Prison Experiment was designed to allow 24 participants (college students) to be arrested in a mock police state scenario without any charges being brought against them. The participants were hooded and put into a prison cellblock with other mock prisoners. The purpose of the experiment was to see how non-criminals would be affected by the prison culture and the oversight of prison guards. Philip G. Zimbardo (2004)