Science Stanford Prison Experiment Shown to Be Questionable - How a Landmark Psychological Study Might Be Bullshit

The Stanford Prison Experiment, one of the most famous and compelling psychological studies of all time, told us a tantalizingly simple story about human nature.

The study took paid participants and assigned them to be “inmates” or “guards” in a mock prison at Stanford University. Soon after the experiment began, the “guards” began mistreating the “prisoners,” implying evil is brought out by circumstance. The authors, in their conclusions, suggested innocent people, thrown into a situation where they have power over others, will begin to abuse that power. And people who are put into a situation where they are powerless will be driven to submission, even madness.

The Stanford Prison Experiment has been included in many, many introductory psychology textbooks and is often cited uncritically. It’s the subject of movies, documentaries, books, television shows, and congressional testimony.

But its findings were wrong. Very wrong. And not just due to its questionable ethics or lack of concrete data — but because of deceit.

In science, too often, the first demonstration of an idea becomes the lasting one.

A new exposé published by Medium based on previously unpublished recordings of Philip Zimbardo, the Stanford psychologist who ran the study, and interviews with his participants, offers convincing evidence that the guards in the experiment were coached to be cruel. It also shows that the experiment’s most memorable moment — of a prisoner descending into a screaming fit, proclaiming, “I’m burning up inside!” — was the result of the prisoner acting. “I took it as a kind of an improv exercise,” one of the guards told reporter Ben Blum. “I believed that I was doing what the researchers wanted me to do.”

Source: https://www.vox.com/2018/6/13/17449118/stanford-prison-experiment-fraud-psychology-replication

 

[polonium]

What's this, you mean academia, constantly pushing the narrative that people are bad and need to be controlled by authority figures, produced a study that states that people are bad and need to be controlled by authority figures?

Imagine my shock!

 

[Piss Clam]

Funding and conflict of interests walk hand and hand.

 

[John Titor]

I think we're going to have to start over again. Let's start with putting lolcows in the same room.

 

[Marvin]

I don’t think you need an experiment to realize, when people have the chance to be shitty to each other, they often take it.

Often? More often than not?

I think you do need an experiment to establish that man's resting state is malice, as opposed to generosity or even apathy.

 

[Schmeckel]

Round up a bunch of danger hairs and incels, and let's see the experiment play out again. This time with hidden cameras and live streamed. For science, of course.

 

[Fork Cartel]

Vox is certainly a credible source. We should throw out half a century of psychology research because the mighty pinnacle of intellectualism that is Vox is questioning it.

Lol you people are fucking exceptional individuals if you buy anything from. . .Vox. . .

You do realize many of the participants have maintained objections for years and that this experiment was never published in any journal? Hello? Anybody home?

 

[NSA]

Isn't this the experiment that is famous for being such a shit show that they didn't even finish it?

Makes you think.

 

[Burned Man]

What's this, you mean academia, constantly pushing the narrative that people are bad and need to be controlled by authority figures, produced a study that states that people are bad and need to be controlled by authority figures?

Imagine my shock!

Didn't the study kind of undermine that by having the people in authority be assholes and abusive? Or do we need authority cracking down on authority keeping people in check?

 

[Alec Benson Leary]

Round up a bunch of danger hairs and incels, and let's see the experiment play out again. This time with hidden cameras and live streamed. For science, of course.

You jest but I'd like to see the study reproduced (faithfully and without tampering) using groups of people our community watch board observes, it'd be interesting to see the results.

 

[polonium]

Didn't the study kind of undermine that by having the people in authority be assholes and abusive? Or do we need authority cracking down on authority keeping people in check?

They were told they could do whatever they liked and assigned a role, so they were absolved for the consequences of their actions, so we were supposed to interpret it as they were, at their core, predisposed to treat people badly, and the inmates were predisposed to act out.

Remember that authoritarians see "the state" as being made a magical class of pure hearted individuals who always act with the best intentions of society in mind, which is why they think governments will fix things instead of enriching themselves and gathering power for their own ends. It's why collectivism always turns out the way it does, and why people that advocate for it are lolcows.

 

[Koby_Fish]

So...was the reason for the deceit to make the study more interesting, or were they trying to push some kind of narrative with this?

It's the same kind of people/narrative that try to argue that the average joe sixpack is one paycheck away from SUDDENLY FASCIST HITLER-LOVING NAZI.

 

[Big Nasty]

A landmark event in IRL trolling.

 

[Derp Potato]

So this study was nothing more than the typical "hypnotize me, Cap'n" event.

Not surprised.

 

[Yop Yop]

Perhaps the young men who took part in the study feel extremely guilty about the way they behaved during the experiment, and are thus blaming their behavior on the authority figures (the researchers). People often default all responsibility to authority, as in the experiment where men and women were told to give electrical shocks to people on the other side of a wall if they got a trivia question wrong. Ultimately they ended up "killing" the other person. Who was paid to scream each time he received a "shock". They said "I was just doing what the researcher wanted me to do", the same as the young men in the prison experiment.

All the researcher said was "the experiment must continue" or something to that effect, when the participants thought they might be killing the person on the other side, and they continued. I'm sure they've been trying to justify their behavior during that time for their entire lives.

 

[Piss Clam]

They should just do a study of HOA's in the US. You'd probably get your overlord prison result right there.

For those who are not familiar you can find some real nazi's there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeowner_association

 

[Derp Potato]

They should just do a study of HOA's in the US. You'd probably get your overlord prison result right there.

For those who are not familiar you can find some real nazi's there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeowner_association

HOAs can be good, very rarely. 99% of the time they're a fucking curse and those that are on the HOA board deserve any hate.

Also why I'm glad I didn't buy in to a HOA.

 

[Dysnomia]

My guess? Most of the actors weren't originally INTENDING to push a narrative, but the idea of the "hellhole prison" is embedded in the public consciousness, so they all acted in ways that aligned with it.

The results were VERY flashy, and therefore likely to get fat stacks of grant cash, so none of the actual scientists were particularly inclined to question it because they need money to live.

EDIT: And the actual scientists being able to push the nihilistic "WE'RE INHERENTLY MONSTERS" narrative that seemed to be in vogue at the time.

You can take something else away from the study then. People are heavily influenced by the media and will act in accordance to what they've been told. I assume none of the participants were ever in prison. But I bet they've all seen prison movies.

Honestly, guards have to develop a tough attitude when every day their lives at at stake going up against dindus who have nothing to lose and don't care if they get another life sentence tacked on for murdering you. If you don't get in the prisoner's face they will get in yours and they will not back down.

 

[Ma_Hooty]

I always thought the experiment sounded over-the-top and it was a fucking cop teaching us about criminal justice who told us it was bull and why while the psych professor the semester before said it was one of the most important experiments we've conducted.
Sorry, gonna have to believe someone who is part of that field over some schmo who learned about it in history books.

Spoiler: Bit of a pwrlvl?

I have a co-worker who is a retired police officer and worked at several jails and detention centers. She told me that, while prisoners can get violent, it's usually in high risk prisons who hold violent offenders that have the majority of the outbursts you hear about.
But she did tell me that the guards did get aggressive when it sometimes wasn't needed (like, antagonizing and screaming at them or acting threatening), though it never got to throwing hands or neglect.

This is their career (which pays really well) and if you fuck it up, you're not just out, but now you have a black stain on your reputation - you're now a liability and no one is going to hire a violent employee.

 

[Haramburger]

IF it was such a reputable study, it should have been repeatable multiple times with similar results, right? If it was ever in question, should they have re-run the experiment to confirm the results?

 

[AnOminous]

I can't imagine why anyone would be very motivated to try to discredit a study on how easy it is to manipulate people. It's not like they possibly have any interest in manipulating people or anything.

I bet they go after Milgram next, even though that was done in dozens of different ways under all sorts of circumstances to see if they could increase how effective it was.