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The Stanford Prison Experiment: Zimbardo's Ethical Paradigm

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This experiment fits into Kidder’s ethical dilemma paradigms of short-term vs long-term. In fact, Zimbardo choose the long term effects of his experiment over the short term effects of it. The Stanford prison experiment had a short-term effect on the university students that could not bear the prison life for long and the prison was ended after 6 days only. The long hours of imprisonment revealed that the students had become depressed while the guards had already become cruel at their maximum. The prisoners were humiliated and embarrassed by the guards. The guards were cruel and even made the prisoners do menial tasks. The prisoners also broke and could no longer control their emotions, some prisoners also went into depression. For example, one prisoner had to be released after 36 hours because of uncontrollable bursts of screaming, crying and anger. But, the experiment had long term effects that Zimbardo thought to be superior to the short-term effects, hence he decided to continue the experiment. Zimbardo chose to get the long-term effects instead of worrying about the short-term effects. The long-term effects of the Stanford Prison Guard experiment are that it has showed that social roles are a dominant strength in human nature. The guards and prisoners lived as though they were actually guards and prisoners. …show more content…

Even though the goals of this experiment were to study the psychological effects of prison on people, it did that and many more by showing how our behaviors can be changed through the roles we participate in. It was also learned that when playing a role most people have a normative conformity and this experiment as many ethical issues that have been discussed in this paper. Are we, as people, greater than the sum of our roles? Or are we truly defined by our roles, and our roles alone? These are questions that need to be reflected

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In summary, the purpose of the Stanford Prison Experiment was supposed to demonstrate that powerful situational forces, much like Abu Ghraib, could over-ride individual dispositions and choices, leading good people to do bad things simply because of the role they found themselves

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Nathan Adkins AP Psych 4th Hour October 5th, 2017     Stanford Prison Experiment     Dr. Philip Zimbardo wanted to conduct an experiment where he could study the psychological effects of becoming a prisoner/prison guard. The experiment was canceled after only 6 days because it showed to be detrimental to the subjects’ mental health and wellbeing.    

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The guards were instructed to maintain order anyway they wanted without using physical violence. Zimbardo wanted the guards to seem intimidating while the prisoners were made to look inferior and were to be referred to with their ID number only. After the prisoners were assigned their roles and the guards took their post was the effect of the experiment finally setting in. On the morning of the second day the prisoners began to rebel against the guards by ripping off their ID numbers and barring the doors while taunting the guards. This event was the first step down the slippery slope that would follow.

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In the Zimbardo prison experiment, participants are arbitrarily chosen to be either guards or prisoners. However, both the guards and the prisoners internalize their roles immediately. The study is terminated after 6 days because the guards began physically and emotionally abusing the prisoners. This experiment “reveals a message we do not want to accept: that most of us can undergo significant character transformations when we are caught up in the crucible of social forces” (Zimbardo, 2007, p.211). The Stanford Prison Experiment shows how latent violent and aggressive personalities are easily realized when one has dominance over submissive personalities.

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These ethical issues talked about above could have been easily avoided and could have impacted the experiment drastically. If Zimbardo only had the role to oversee the experiment, the experiment could have ended a lot sooner and could have protected a lot of the inmates. Since Zimbardo was serving as warden, he ultimately had the final decision of what goes on. He wanted to see the experiment out, so made decisions that allowed the experiment to go on when in reality it should have been stopped. Very early on in the experiment, the guards needed to take charge and show that they are the ones to obey and listen too.

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Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted by Professor Philip Zimbardo in August 1971. During this experiment, Zimbardo and his colleagues created a prison atmosphere by using realistic methods. College students participated to either become prisoners or guards; they were used to see how people react in certain social situations where a person has more power than another. This experiment revealed how much people’s personalities change when given the opportunity to act superior over another person. This experiment began with the Palo Alto police arresting the group of college students who were the “prisoners.”

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The Stanford Prison Experiment Section 1: Introduction Human research has been going on since before BC. We have always been curious about how our bodies work, so experiments have always taken place. At Stanford University, Dr. Philip Zimbardo oversaw an experiment known as the Stanford Prison Experiment, which involved 24 volunteer male undergraduate students being divided randomly into groups of two as "prisoners" and "guards" in a prison-like simulation. The U.S. Office of Naval funded the experiment to study how the human mind adapts to a new environment, but it ended up being a voyage of psychological shocks. There were horrifying revelations on how "roles" and "power" influence human behavior.

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In the six days that the experiment ran they saw the personalities that the prisoner and prison guards took.

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Stanford Prison Experiment Philip Zimbardo questioned, “What happens when you put good people in an evil place? Does humanity win over evil, or does evil triumph?” (Zimbardo, 1971) In 1971 a psychologist named Philip Zimbardo conducted an experiment on the effects prison has on young males with the help of his colleague Stanley Milgram. They wanted to find out if the reports of brutality from guards was due to the way guards treated prisoners or the prison environment.

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The Stanford prison experiment was conducted in 1971 at Stanford University. The experiment was directed by Professor Philip Zimbardo. The purpose of the study was to understand the psychological effects of becoming a prisoner or prisoner guard. Professor Zimbardo divided the volunteer participant students into the role of prisoner and guard, and he puts them in a prison-like setting in the basement of the psychology department at Stanford University. The study was planned to last for a couple of weeks, but it ended after six days that has happened because of the cruelty of the guards and the suffering of the prisoners.

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Some guards took advantage of this opportunity and began abusing the prisoners by denying them basic necessities like beds, food, clothes, and hygienic products (tooth brushes and buckets instead of toilets) after the prisoners rebelled on the second day of the experiment. The prisoners themselves were heavily traumatized to the point where they forgot they were participating in an experiment and could willingly leave on their own. According to the article, the chaos that occurred in this experiment

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Unit 1 Written Assignment Literature Review of article on Standard Prison Experiment Introduction This article concerns the Stanford Prison experiment carried out in 1971 at Stanford University. The experiment commenced on August 14, and was stopped after only six days. It is one of the most noted psychological experiments on authority versus subordinates. The studies which emerged from this have been of interest to those in prison and military fields due to its focus on the psychology associated with authority.

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One of the most infamous experiments conducted in the history of psychology was the Stanford Prison Experiment. The main objective of this experiment was to see what effects would occur when a psychological experiment into human nature was performed. As I read through the material provided, I noticed that my thoughts on the matter were similar to many; that it was a complete failure as a scientific research project. However, his findings did provide us with something much more important that is still being talked about today; insight into human psychology and social behavior.

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Authority gives a person the chance to feel superior, and as seen throughout this film, those within the position of authority will only then abuse this opportunity. Given the chance for people to gain authority or rather the sense of authority is enough to awaken the evil within. Within the movie, The Stanford Prison Experiment the guards were enabled to set a line of difference between the prisoners and themselves. They were able to make the prisoners feel weak or emasculated, forcing the students to strip and wear the assigned prison clothes that barely covered their genitals (Alvarez). Forcing the prisoners to wear these feminine articles of clothing and assigning them a number, gives the opportunity to strip away their personality and

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Another thing that makes this experiment beautiful is that it can help the police and military offices to train their people in coping the stress of being imprisoned among the prisoners. It would help them to know how that prison environment has a great factor in creating brutal behavior among the

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