Preview

The Unethical Methods: The Stanford Prison Experiment

Satisfactory Essays
Open Document
Open Document
202 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
The Unethical Methods: The Stanford Prison Experiment
The Stanford prison experiment practiced unethical methods that put unnecessary harm on the prisoners, and social accountability of guards was to guarantee prisoner's safety. However, the guards engaged performed horrible acts of violence that harmed the prisoners physical and mental distress. The prisoner's human rights violated by the individuals that were selected to be guards committed cruel treatment, inhuman acts, and degrading treatment. The guards did not practice ethical behaviors enforcing punishment that was physically and mentally harmful and the unethical behavior of the guards was extremely unethical behavior in a controlled scientific environment. The alternate method is fieldwork process that research that allows the researcher

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Stanford Prison Experiment was an experiment that Philip Zimbardo evented. He wanted to study the human response of captivity, of the prison life. Zimbardo randomly assigned roles to the prisoners and the guards. Each role was uniquely identified. For example, he gave the guards sticks and sunglasses and the prisoners were arrested by the police department and were forced into the basement of the jail which was converted into the psychology department that was converted into a makeshift jail. Zimbardo wanted the experiment to be as realistic as he possibly could have made it, therefore, he assigned each role to help do so. Testing each individual and then assigning them to roles would of gave inconclusive readings and therefore, it was…

    • 164 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    In discussions of the Stanford Prison Experiment conducted by Philip G. Zimbardo in 1970, one controversial issue has been whether or not the experiment should have ever been attempted. On the one hand, Dr. Zimbardo and his colleagues argued that the experiment gave them a deeper understanding of human suffering and a greater empathy for their fellow man (Ratnesar 2011). On the other hand, one of the former guards contended that the experiment made him more hostile and less sympathetic during his time as a guard and that the circumstances significantly altered his perception of what was appropriate behavior. Others even maintain that the prison experiment degraded the prisoners so greatly, empowered the guards to such a great extent, and even affected Dr. Zimbardo’s behavior and mannerisms so dramatically that it thoroughly altered their sense of…

    • 1846 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Some examples of dysfunction during the stanford prison experiment are one of the guys went into the prison experiment. He thought it was going to be an easy way to get money for a summer job and then when he got there he got the role of being a prisoner. He just lost it he started to say that he was going crazy and that something was eating him inside out. He felt like he was going to explode and so the guards reacted by putting him in the hole. Then the guy would still yell and say he wanted out and they wouldn't let him out until he got the chance to go and talk to the guy that was running this whole thing and they let him out.…

    • 389 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Can good, moral, and virtuous people be pushed to do bad things? This article seeks to compare an experiment done in 1971 to a real life military situation during wartime. The article also tries to link the experiment to another horrible act done by someone suffering from various mental illnesses with extremely mixed results. Is there a correlation between these three events as far as the mental states of the participants?…

    • 688 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Have you ever noticed that certain people act and behave differently when they are with crowds versus when they are alone? Being in a large crowd can really impact individual to act in a certain way that they seem to fit in with the group and sometimes do things more anonymous as it is in a large crowd. Both Zimbardo and Le Bon believe that bystanders are less responsible and more likely to commit violence than when people are alone. Philip Zimbardo is a psychologist and a professor at Stanford University; he researches the cause of evil in people by doing a Stanford prison experiment. Zimbardo states about how evil can cause good people easily by the peers that they are surrounded by and the culture and traditional way changes can affect people…

    • 1535 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The idea of government has been around for centuries. It has changed and expanded so much over the years that certain governments have morphed into a more violent institution, in some cases. Because governments have changed so much over the years, certain governments have slowly evolved to become extreme, and may be considered seriously dangerous in the future.…

    • 474 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    A team at Stanford University, led by Phillip Zimbardo, conducted the Stanford Prison Experiment to investigate causes of conflict between military guards and prisoners. Zimbardo and his team were seeking to observe the inherent personality traits of prisoners and guards and see if this was the chief cause of abusive behavior in these settings (Haney, Banks, and Zimbardo, 1973). This study is one that is well know and well-recognized. Zimbardo and his study are often discussed in many psychology courses today, and have even caused reform in prison systems as well as IRB/APA ethical committees.…

    • 1783 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    While assessing the Stanford Prison Simulation encounter, I noticed a lot of ethical issues that stemmed from the Psychologist researchers and the guards as well. First and foremost, there were no clear instructions as to what the guards should do to get results for the research and there were no adamant clear instructions as to what the guards could not do to the prisoner’s. The purpose of research is to measure data and its outcome, and ensuring the protection and safety of the subjects involved in the research study. Allowing the continuance of the prisoner’s humiliations, distress, and the abuse of power from the guards, was ethically inappropriate and incorrect. It is morally and ethically incorrect to watch behind the scenes, while such malice intent was being performed and negatively affecting all participants, including the researchers, during the research process and after the study was pulled. Prisoner’s were made to feel as though they could not leave the simulated prison and taunted by the other fellow prisoner’s and guards as well. Imagine being distressed, taunted, and being bribed…

    • 603 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Most people desire some sort of power. Whether it is political power or economic power, this yearning runs our society. Some people use their power to benefit others, and other person inappropriately use their power to degrade and diminish. As explored in the Stanford Prison Experiment, Philip Zimbardo states people change with they are given “power without oversight” (Zimbardo, The Psychology of Evil, TedTalk). Though the students were considered “good apples,” the combination of situation and the system caused the guards to lose their identities and to abuse their power in inhumane ways. The results of the experiment were derived many observations and conclusions about the subjects; however, Zimbardo’s switch between running the experiment…

    • 931 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Experiments have been done for many more years than humans can count on the two hands in which they possess. Two experiments, in particular, were written, “The Stanford Prison Experiment” by Philip G. Zimbardo and “The Perils of Obedience” by Stanley Milgram. These experiments can be controversial for many different reasons, but neither of these experiments were completed under conditions of normality. The information collected in these experiments isn’t exactly based off of real life situations, it becomes difficult not to question the relevance of these experiments.…

    • 743 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Those involved had forgotten they were playing a role. The prisoners were "behaving in pathological ways" and no longer realized that they were free to quit at anytime (Zimbardo, 2006). The guards had either become sadistic or allowed the behavior, believing that they were unable to do anything about it; and as previously stated, even the researchers playing a role had begun to lose their grip on reality (Zimbardo, 2006). This experiment showed just how detrimental inhumane prison conditions were to the health of everyone in the prison system from Super-Intendents to guards and prisoners.…

    • 641 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Apa Code Of Ethics Essay

    • 801 Words
    • 4 Pages

    For Instance, The Stanford Prison Experiment carry out by Haney, Banks & Zimbardo is known for its significant study but also its violation of ethics in psychology (Haney, Banks & Zimbardo, 1973). The concept of this experiment was to determine the role of conformity in an experiment act to establish the correlation between prison guards and prisoners in the prison system(Haney, Banks & Zimbardo, 1973). Although, its success, the experiment received immense condemnation due to the ethical violations that occurred during the experiment. Philip Zimbardo failed to stop the experiment as soon as it was getting out of hand. Zimbardo and his colleagues were determining to see how far the experiment could go they failed to see the damage it was doing to their…

    • 801 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    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.…

    • 1435 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Best Essays

    The use of humans as research subjects has been a long debated issue within the scientific community. There are a lot of factors that go into regulating such research studies, like limiting coercion, undue inducement, and vulnerability of the population of the subjects in the study. To help control these issues, there have been many guidelines that have been implemented to ensure the safety and wellbeing of the research subjects.…

    • 4236 Words
    • 17 Pages
    Best Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Abu Ghirab prison was the most horrific, brutal and dehumanizing thing I have even come across. The level of suffering the inmates experienced words cannot express how terrifying it is. There were male as well as female and even worst, children was in that dreadful place. They were treated worse than animals in my opinion, I cannot see in no one lives they should have to encounter such gruesome experience. The Stanford prison experiment was conducted on August 14th to 20th, 1971.The team of researchers were led by professor Phillip Zimbardo.This experiment was conducted with college students. This experiment was also dehumanizing although the prisoners were forced to engage in many events, such as defecating in buckets and used their hands…

    • 395 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays