The Stanford Prison Experiment
Fake prisoners and fake guards in a spurious jail is a peculiar way to determine roles in society. Philip G. Zimbardo was the mastermind of the Stanford Prison Experiment, which was a psychological experiment that determined the roles of members in a society that became a fiasco (“Philip G. Zimbardo” 1). The experiment left emotional and mental scars on mock-prisoner lives. The Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) illustrates the way a person changes when a label and power is all of a sudden given to hoax guards in order to control fraud prisoners.
The experiment had a unit of people willing to help the study (“On the Ethics of Intervention…”1). Researchers involved of Philip G. Zimbardo, Craig Haney, William Curtis Banks, and David Jaffe (“On …show more content…
(“On the Ethics of Intervention…” narration 1-3). More than seventy people signed up, but only a total of twenty four people were ‘clean’ from crimes or psychological problems (“On the Ethics of Intervention…” 1). “Virtually all had indicated a preference for being a prisoner because they could not imagine going to college and ending up as a prison guard. On the other hand, they could imagine being imprisoned for a driving violation or some act of civil disobedience” (“Reflection on the Stanford…” 5). Prisoners were arrested for either burglary or armed robbery (Lestik 1). The guards and convicts were destined to their roles by a flip of a coin to be fair (Lestik 1). College students who were selected to represent the role of prisoners were arrested by the Palo Alto police as if they actually committed action against the law (Lestik 1). Rights were read, fingerprints were stamped, and they were handcuffed into a police car (Lestik 1). The prisoners did not know what was going on even though they signed up for the experiment (Lestik 1). “We were studying both guard and prisoner behavior, so neither group was given any instruction on how to behave. The guards were merely told to maintain law and order, to use their billy clubs as only symbolic weapons and not actual ones, and to realize that if the prisoners escaped the study would be terminated” …show more content…
It wasn’t only the superior’s fault, but also the weak’s fault. Convicts should not have rebelled, but should have obeyed the authoritative guards. The SPE demonstrates the way humans abuse the power they are given, whether that power is real or perceived, and social profiling of an individual affects their
The experiment had a unit of people willing to help the study (“On the Ethics of Intervention…”1). Researchers involved of Philip G. Zimbardo, Craig Haney, William Curtis Banks, and David Jaffe (“On …show more content…
(“On the Ethics of Intervention…” narration 1-3). More than seventy people signed up, but only a total of twenty four people were ‘clean’ from crimes or psychological problems (“On the Ethics of Intervention…” 1). “Virtually all had indicated a preference for being a prisoner because they could not imagine going to college and ending up as a prison guard. On the other hand, they could imagine being imprisoned for a driving violation or some act of civil disobedience” (“Reflection on the Stanford…” 5). Prisoners were arrested for either burglary or armed robbery (Lestik 1). The guards and convicts were destined to their roles by a flip of a coin to be fair (Lestik 1). College students who were selected to represent the role of prisoners were arrested by the Palo Alto police as if they actually committed action against the law (Lestik 1). Rights were read, fingerprints were stamped, and they were handcuffed into a police car (Lestik 1). The prisoners did not know what was going on even though they signed up for the experiment (Lestik 1). “We were studying both guard and prisoner behavior, so neither group was given any instruction on how to behave. The guards were merely told to maintain law and order, to use their billy clubs as only symbolic weapons and not actual ones, and to realize that if the prisoners escaped the study would be terminated” …show more content…
It wasn’t only the superior’s fault, but also the weak’s fault. Convicts should not have rebelled, but should have obeyed the authoritative guards. The SPE demonstrates the way humans abuse the power they are given, whether that power is real or perceived, and social profiling of an individual affects their