How Is The Stanford Prison Experiment Unethical

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

I believe that although valuable information came from it, the ethical quality of this experiment is very questionable. I suspected that the guards would turn more authoritative than any of them would have in real life, but I never thought that they would go as far as ridiculing some prisoners to tears. Although there were none of the prisoners had any long term effects from participating, while in the experiment they would be harassed and punished for no reason, which is where I think the experiment should have been discontinued. Control of the experiment was lost as everybody involved, including Zimbardo became completely engulfed in their roles of the prison. This really makes me question Zimbardo and the other researchers to how they could be too involved in their own experiment to stop the experiment when it began to grow out of control. I think that in the experiment the guards showed who they really were. None of them would have acted that way in their own lives. Zimbardo watched all of this on a hidden camera, and didn’t do anything until long after I along with many others think it should have been. It’s not only that the participants didn’t see the unethical characteristics of this experiment, a priest that was called in and the prisoners parents that came for a visitation day didn’t protest the treatment of their sons after hearing stories of the mock prison. There is something about these symbols of

Conclusion: 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. The “prison” environment was an important factor in creating the guards’ brutal behavior (none of the participants who acted as guards showed sadistic tendencies before the study). Therefore, the roles that people play can shape their behavior and attitudes.

“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).

Some other preconditions were to make the experimental setting bear a resemblance as closely to a functional simulation of the psychology of imprisonment as humanly possible. He also wanted to make sure that there was the absence of any earlier indoctrination in how to play the randomly assigned roles; to leave that up to each participant’s prior societal teachings of the meaning of prisons and the behavioral scripts associated with the oppositional roles (Zambardo, 2005). Although he had a significantly large abundance

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.

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

The Stanford Prison Experiment had many issues that started a chain of problems within the experiment. Ethical issues that challenged the subjects who partook in the experiment moral values and behavior. Many of the steps taken in the experiment were unethical, one being the fact that the subjects were arrested without consent. Furthermore, the subjects were dehumanized and taunted, and humiliated which tested them physically and mentally. They were told to do push-ups as a punishment and often with a foot on their backs. After a rebellion the unethical behavior from the subjects who were guards increased. Beds along with proper use of toilet facilities were taken away which is deemed extremely unethical. Harassment and intimidation were pretty frequent among guard subjects to make prison subjects more dependent on them. The psychological harm of the subjects was not taken into consideration and it is seen from Prisoners #819 and #8612 as they began to crumble mentally.

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.

Philip G. Zimbardo, a social psychologist, presented a classic psychology research in the situational effects on human behaviour. This explains how situations can modify an individual to act in ways they would not have acted before. Zimbardo highlights that a person are seduced into evil by dehumanising and labelling others; and notes that an individual who has a sense of anonymity increases their aggression, such as wearing a uniform or a mask. The Stanford prison experiment, which Zimbardo conducted, showed that institutional forces and the peer pressures amongst volunteered guards to disregard the potential harm of their actions on to the volunteered prisoners. In other words, a person does not need a motive, and what is needed is a situation that facilitates through the lines between good and evil (Dittmann, 2004).

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