C1 – Advanced
In August 1971, Stanford University psychology professor Philip Zimbardo set up a simulated prison in the basement of the university’s building and hired ordinary people to play the roles of guards and prisoners. The experiment was supposed to last for 2 weeks. However, things got out of hand and they had to shut it down on the 6th day.
Watch the video to learn more about the Standford Experiment.
Discussion Questions:
- What is the Stanford experiment about? What is the “Lucifer effect”?
- What is your opinion about/reaction to this experiment?
- How did the experiment transform the participants playing as guards?
- In your opinion, was it ethical to conduct this experiment even with the written consent of the participants?
- Would you be interested to participate in a social experiment?
8 replies on “The Stanford Experiment”
1. What is the Stanford experiment about? What is the “Lucifer effect”?
The experiment is about how the normal people behaviour changes to radical and sadistic behaviour when these people are in bad place.
The Lucifer effect describes how people behaviour become the worst possible behaviour.
2. What is your opinion about/reaction to this experiment?
From my point of view the experiment got out of hands, because no one followed de rules properly.
Maybe, if the experiment had had more control, it would have been success, but it was not the case.
3. How did the experiment transform the participants playing as guards?
They adopted their functions, but they got out of control and exceeded what was asked of them. I think it happened because there weren´t good controls.
4. In your opinion, was it ethical to conduct this experiment even with the written consent of the participants?
Not at all, I mean the experiment should never have existed, because without good controls, the safety of the participants was not assured, so even with the written consent I think it was not ethical.
5. Would you be interested to participate in a social experiment?
Yes, I would like to participate in a social experiment, but not in this kind of experiments. I thinking about a more moderate and easy experiment, for example how people live whith their pets. But nothing that could affect my health.
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1. What is the Stanford experiment about? What is the “Lucifer effect”?
The experiment want to test the environmental effects on people’s behavior.
The Lucifer effect is a theory that says educated people and integrated into society can act evil due to the influence of situations
2. What is your opinion about/reaction to this experiment?
I heard about this experiment before. I´m not impressed, throughout the history we can find many situations where people act evil.
Normal people act like they never thought they could do those things. There is a german film about this experiment called “Das Experiment”
3. How did the experiment transform the participants playing as guards?
Early on they began to act as bad guardians, abusing their authority.
4. In your opinion, was it ethical to conduct this experiment even with the written consent of the participants?
I thinks there is nothing wrong with this experimient, and yes was ethical because the experiment mesures the people’s behaviors under some circumstances. Nobody forced them to act the way they did
5. Would you be interested to participate in a social experiment?
I don´t want to be part of social experiment, due to we might see how evil we can be in some situations
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1. What is the Stanford experiment about? What is the “Lucifer effect”?
The experiment is about setting up a simulated prison and hire ordinary people to play roles of guards and prisoners.
The Lucifer effect describes the point at which an ordinary, normal person acts evil.
2. What is your opinion about/reaction to this experiment?
In my opinion is an impressive experiment. I didn’t know anything about it and I totally surprised. It is incredible how the human brain can be manipulated.
3. How did the experiment transform the participants playing as guards?
Their role was quickly adopted, but in the worst possible way, they began to abuse the authority given
4. In your opinion, was it ethical to conduct this experiment even with the written consent of the participants?
I think it was an experiment and that it’s why it was ethical, because participants agreed and the result was not clear, although maybe Philip Zimbardo had a slight idea of what was going to happen and it is what he wanted to check.
5. Would you be interested to participate in a social experiment?
Depends on the experiment. I’m not sure but I think I wouldn’t mind
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Discussion Questions:
1. What is the Stanford experiment about? What is the “Lucifer effect”?
The Stanford Experiment was a psychological experiment in order to test the behaviour of normal people in prison conditions, some doing the inmates’ role, others de guards’ roles.
If you put good people in bad place, do the people triumph or does the place corrupt them?
2. What is your opinion about/reaction to this experiment?
I think the experiment was a complete disaster, out of scientific rigor and control, a shame for the researchers. A good example the how don’t do it. Never the experimenter, the searcher, can be part of the experiment… It was a bias experiment ir order to reach some oriented results. A fraud.
3. How did the experiment transform the participants playing as guards?
The ended up playing their roles in a extreme way because there wasn’t any kind of control or rules in the “fake” prison.
4. In your opinion, was it ethical to conduct this experiment even with the written consent of the participants?
As I said before, in my opinion this experiment was a complete failure because didn’t follow the scientific methods… But doing the experiment following the rules (as some people did later) there is no kind of problem.
5. Would you be interested to participate in a social experiment?
No not at all, I’m old for that… Maybe like a resercher?
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