Stanford Prison Experiment

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May 11, 2024

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1 Stanford Prison Experiment Jared Briggs University of Phoenix PSY/390 Learning and Cognition 04/12/2021 Ricky Fenwick

2 Stanford Prison Experiment The Stanford Prison Experiment was an attempt by Phillip Zimbardo and his colleagues to see what the impact of becoming an inmate or guard in a prison was. This is one of the best- known experiments, if not the most controversial, in psychology today (Cherry, 2021). The experiment was slated to go on for 14 days but was shut down on day six. The experiment had 24 students from the university. Of these 24 students nine were assigned as guards and nine were assigned as inmates. This essay will discuss the impact of both The Stanford Prison Experiment on psychology today and the social learning theory and its tenets. Social Learning Theory The Social Learning Theory is defined as a theory of human behavior, prominent is the 1940s through the 1960s, proposing that the kinds of reinforcements an individual has experienced in past societal contexts will determine how that individual will act in any given situation (Gluck et al, 2020). The major tenets of the social learning theory are presence of a model, memories must be stored in an accessible format, the observer must have the ability to reproduce the action and lastly the observer must have some motivation the reproduce the action (Gluck et al, 2020). The Stanford Prison Experiment used the social learning theory in that the observers wanted to see what would happen if they took students from the university and placed them in a mock prison and basically let them run loose. Within this closed group they created their own rules and regulations concerning behavior of inmates and guards. The participants created their own world inside of this mock prison. The guards moved into their roles and behaved in ways that they would not normally behave. Inmates for the most part became passive and depressed (Cherry, 2021).

3 The Guards and Inmates The guards and the inmates were the participants in the experiment. They were chosen from 70 applicants who applied to a newspaper ad in California in 1971. These 70 applicants were screened for psychological problems, medical disabilities, or a history of crime or drug abuse. That left 24 students. These 24 students were randomly put into guard and inmate roles by the flip of a coin. Nine were placed into guard roles and nine were placed into inmate roles with the remainder put into back up positions of inmate and guard spots (Zimbardo, 2019). The inmates were all dressed in smocks and stocking caps made from women’s stockings in order to simulate shaving their heads. They were also fitted with a chain and a lock on their ankle. This chain was there to remind the inmates of the oppressiveness of their new environment (Zimbardo, 2019). From that point on they were only referred to by their number and could only refer to themselves and other inmates by number. Each cell had three inmates in it. The inmates slept or sat in these cells, there was not room for much else. The guards were dressed in uniforms of khaki. They were given mirrored sunglasses to always wear. These sunglasses were meant to stop the inmates from seeing the eyes and reading the emotions of the guards. All the guards looked the same. This promoted anonymity (Zimbardo, 2019). Three guards worked three eight-hour shifts. The Experiment There was no training for the guards or inmates. The guards were given freedom to do as they pleased, within limits, to keep law and order in good condition. They made up their own set of seemingly arbitrary rules as time went on. The guards were warned of the seriousness of what they were about to undertake and how dangerous this job could become (Zimbardo, 2019). The

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