Philip Zimbardo Stanford Prison Experiment

1675 Words7 Pages
I. Introduction A divergent balance of power in a particular setting can lead otherwise typical human beings to behave abnormally. For example, the Holocaust manipulated thousands of Europeans to execute millions of Jews because one man, Adolf Hitler, deemed it acceptable. The minds of the Nazi war criminals were questioned during the Nuremberg Trials, for each defendant claimed they were simply “following the rules”. Social psychologists have aimed to understand why people follow orders from authority, even when the request may be considered unethical. This human nature of obedience influenced Philip Zimbardo to create the Stanford Prison Study, along with influencing Stanley Milgram to create his notorious “shock” experiment. II. The Holocaust…show more content…
“There was no involuntary homosexuality, no racism, no physical beatings, no threat to life by prisoners against each other or the guards. Moreover, the maximum anticipated “sentence” was only two weeks and, unlike some prison systems, could not be extended indefinitely for infractions of the internal operating rules of the prison” (Zimbardo 1973). The possibility of only a case of “acting” was also further looked into. The prisoners had no rules on what they could talk about with their fellow cell mates, yet the majority would only talk about the prison life, and nothing about their outside life. It was also concluded that having the cameras around did not affect the guards and prisoners as most would think. The guards were actually more aggressive when not seen by cameras or the wardens. Yet, when the guards were interviewed later on, they claimed to have just been playing a role (Zimbardo 1973). The most shocking aftermath to the experiment is the interactions with the prisoners. The prisoners had been introduced to a Catholic priest who agreed to take part in the experiment. When the prisoners greeted the priest, they did not refer to themselves by their name, but by their given prisoner number. They had also claimed that they would give up the money if it meant leaving the study. This contradicts with the whole reason they came in the first place: the pay (Zimbardo…show more content…
In 1961, shortly after World War II had begun, Stanley Eichmann had questions of if Adolf and his followers were truly terrible people or simply following orders. This sparked the Milgram Shock Experiment. Forty males between the age of twenty and fifty, around the New Haven area, were invited to volunteer by either a newspaper advertisement or mail solicitation. The subjects were told the experiment was a study about the importance of punishment for learning. There was a wide range in the education level of the men, branching from those who had not completed elementary school to those with a doctorate or professional degree. All subjects would be paid $4.50 whether they completed the experiment or not (Milgram
Open Document