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Compose a 1500 words essay on Zimbardos Stanford Prison Experiment. Needs to be plagiarism free!Download file to see previous pages... The purpose of this essay is to examine the SPE in the context of
Compose a 1500 words essay on Zimbardos Stanford Prison Experiment. Needs to be plagiarism free!
Download file to see previous pages...The purpose of this essay is to examine the SPE in the context of more recent research (such as the BBC Prison Experiment []) to show that, whilst there are definite methodological considerations to make, the SPE made a huge contribution to this field of psychology and opened up a new dynamic of assessing and understanding situational influences on behaviour. Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted in 1971, and was originally intended to help uncover some of the psychological aspects of conflict between military guards and prisoners (Zimbardo, 2004). The experiment consisted of 24 male participants who were selected by Zimbardo from a group of volunteers for having good physical and mental health (Zimbardo, 1975). These participants were then randomly assigned roles, termed ‘prisoner’ and ‘guard’, in a mock prison setting at Stanford University, and were then observed to obtain results about what would happen in this situation. Many of the participants adapted to their role extremely quickly, with prison guards becoming militant and authoritarian in their actions, and prisoners staging a revolt (Zimbardo, 1975). These results, whilst having some methodological considerations, shocked the world of social psychology, and many members of the public due to the release of films showing parts of the experiment. One of the conclusions of the infamous SPE was that a legitimizing ideology is a great behavioural adapter, because it can justify previously unappealing actions for a greater good (Zimbardo, 1975). This conclusion helps to establish why situational influences on behaviour can explain many of the horrific events of the 20th century, and perhaps even before that (Zimbardo, 2007). Rationalizing a behaviour by adapting it to a worldview is thought to be common in human behaviour, and several studies have reinforced this idea (e.g. Brady &. Logsdon, 1988). Interestingly, Zimbardo stated that several people came to view the SPE, and only one of these visitors voiced concerns about the ethical issues of the study (Zimbardo, 2007), which are now well established (e.g. DeJong, 1975, Lovaglia, 2007). Whilst this finding was not part of the official, published results of the study, it does add some weight to the conclusion, as the legitimizing ideology in this case was the furthering of scientific interest, which allowed visitors to look past ethical issues in favour of science. This conclusion, however, is hotly debated simply because of some methodological considerations that must be made when analysing the SPE. One of the main criticisms of the study is that it’s very nature meant that Zimbardo could not keep to standard scientific controls (Banuazizi &. Movahedi, 1975) and could not maintain objectivity throughout the study (Lovaglia, 2007). This meant that much of the released information about the SPE was based on anecdotal evidence, and it has been argued that this is a flaw which renders the findings of the entire study obsolete (Banuazizi &. Movahedi, 1975).
