Zimbardo’s “Stanford Prison Experiment” was an experiment that turned into more of a catastrophe for all parties involved. It started out as an experiment to observe whether brutality in prison was due to the guards' predisposition and their “sadistic” personalities or if it was due to the general environment of the prison (Mcleod). Both the guards and the prisoners assumed their roles very quickly and behaved according to their role. It did not take long for the rules of the experiment (no physical abuse) to be broken. It was clear that this power and role of authority went to the guards’ heads and the prisoners adapted to a helpless obedient role.
There were, in fact, some benefits to this experiment. It brought to light the harsh environments in prisons and the brutality and mistreatment that takes place inside of them for people who have no prior knowledge of prisons. It also led into the future implications for a study or experiment such as this one. It caused rules and guidelines to be set in place in order to protect people participating in studies such as this one. The detriments of this experiment were the psychological and physical harm that the prisoners were forced to endure even if it wasn’t long term. They consented to terms of the
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While there is some value in the findings of this study, it ultimately was more detrimental than it was beneficial. Some of the value of this study came from what was learned about the ethical guidelines that need to be set in place in experiments and studies. It has also been valuable to learn the necessity of explicit rules in behavior control and the use of punishment over rewards in training agents (Ethics of intervention Stanford prison experiment). While there were things of value learned from this experiment, it would have been better off if this damage could have been avoided altogether and these lessons did not have to be learned the hard