Stanford Prison Experiment

Stanford Prison Experiment

Stanford prison experiment was one that was run to test the psychological effects of prison life for both the prison guards and the prisoners. It was built to look and feel like a real prison for example the laboratory doors in the building were replaced with some steel prison cell like doors, the atmosphere too.

A local newspaper was calling out for volunteers on this psychological experiment and more than 70 people showed interest and applied to this and each of them had to go through diagnostic interviews with personal tests to eliminate candidates with psychological matters, medical disabilities and those that have history with crime and drug abuse, volunteers that passed these tests were promised $15/day.

These prisoners had little or no freedom to go out in the fields and relax, they did almost everything in “the yard” which was the hallway, and this is where the prisoners will play, exercise and eat. Blindfolds were given to prisoners that needed to use the bathroom so they don’t know their way around and eventually try to escape. To get more insight on the experiment, they put video cameras all over the cell to capture prisoner behavior and also bugged the cell rooms to try and listen to inmate conversations.

On arrival, the prisoners were treated like real inmates, from when they were swooped from the streets by cops and handcuffed to the “Stanford county jail” they were blindfolded and so filled with shock. Every prisoner was searched thoroughly and stripped naked, they went further to humiliate these prisoners by spraying them with anti-germs implying that they have germs, every prisoner assigned with a number and a uniform and from then on the prisoners no longer had names but ID numbers which kind of dehumanized them. The guards were given authority and power within boundaries which as time went on they started to enjoy, uniforms, a whistle and some sort of weapon to protect themselves, they had mirror sunglasses at all times to portray intimidation to the prisoners and so their emotions cannot be seen through their eyes and for punishments they would make prisoners do push ups. They had nine prisoners and 9 prison guards to start with.

At the beginning with the prison guards and prisoners still trying to fit into their roles, the prison guards still adjusting to the role and power they suddenly have in the prison the experiment wasn’t going according to plan, this had to be serious. On the second day the prisoners decided to have a rebellion and not coming out of their cells, the guards were frustrated and used physical measures like aiming the fire extinguisher at the cells to get it open and stripping the prisoners. After a while and this measure wasn’t working to calm the rebellion they took to psychological measures, promising the prisoners least involved in the rebellion better cells