stanford prison experiment informed consent

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Informed consent and the stanford prison experiment.

• Stanford County Prison Experiment
• Informed Consent

1. STANFORD COUNTY PRISON EXPERIMENT

The Stanford County prison experiments were conducted in the 1970s by a psychologist at Stanford named Philip Zimbardo. Zimbardo was interested in whether or not the people who went to prison were inherently bad, deviant, aggressive people filled with rage, or whether the prison institution itself promoted these kind of behaviors amongst inmates and guards.

Did the fact of being in the physical space of prison make guards more sadistic and aggressive? Did it make prisoners deviant? Did it make them misbehave?

Philip Zimbardo was actually asking a question about the institution of prison.

IN CONTEXT Zimbardo got a group of 24 clinically sane young men to take part in his prison experiment. He assigned 12 of them to the guard group and the other 12 to the prisoner group. People knew they were taking part in this study, but those in the prisoner group didn't know when they were going to be 'taken' to prison. Zimbardo arrested them by surprise. It was very official, and he tried to make it as realistic as possible--they were arrested, taken to the prison, stripped, given uniforms, numbers, etc. The guards had whistles and uniforms, too. As soon as he got the prisoners in and the guards set up, Zimbardo started cameras rolling and observed. The experiment was supposed to last two weeks, but it got so ugly that he was forced to cut the experiment short after only six days. As soon as prisoners got in there, the guards became sadistic and hostile, forcing the prisoners to do demeaning, effacing things like clean toilets with their bare hands, etc. In response to their new situation, prisoners became sad and depressed; some cried, and some became angry and hostile at the guards. Normal, clinically sane people in both groups started to act insane when thrown into this situation.

big idea Zimbardo's key findings were that people weren't inherently bad, sadistic, depressed, etc., but that the institution promoted these behaviors among people. Prison violence was symptomatic of the institution of prison itself rather than of the inherent personalities of either guards or prisoners.

Stanford Prison Experiment Famous experiment that revealed how the prison structure effects social behavior and shed light on the ethical concerns of social research.

2. INFORMED CONSENT

The Stanford County prison experiment illustrates what you're not supposed to do when experimenting with human subjects. It violates what we call informed consent , which states that when you're doing research with human subjects, everyone must be notified in advance of all the responsibilities and potential risks and dangers of the study.

You can't do as Zimbardo did and pull people out of their homes, put them in a mock prison and deprive them of the basics, without their knowledge or consent.

big idea When conducting sociological research, and all social science research for that matter, you must follow the principle of informed consent any time you're involving human subjects.

Informed Consent When doing research that involves human subjects, everyone must be notified in advance of all the responsibilities, risks, and dangers that are potentially associated with the study.

summary Today you learned about the Stanford County prison experiment and how it illustrates what you're not supposed to do with respect to informed consent when conducting social research.

Source: This work is adapted from Sophia author Zach Lamb.

When doing research that involves human subjects, everyone must be notified in advance of all the responsibilities, risks, and dangers that are potentially associated with the study.

Famous experiment that revealed how the prison structure effects social behavior and shed light on the ethical concerns of social research.

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The Stanford Prison Experiment

• Participants
• Setting and Procedure

In August of 1971, psychologist Philip Zimbardo and his colleagues created an experiment to determine the impacts of being a prisoner or prison guard. The Stanford Prison Experiment, also known as the Zimbardo Prison Experiment, went on to become one of the best-known studies in psychology's history —and one of the most controversial.

This study has long been a staple in textbooks, articles, psychology classes, and even movies. Learn what it entailed, what was learned, and the criticisms that have called the experiment's scientific merits and value into question.

Purpose of the Stanford Prison Experiment

Zimbardo was a former classmate of the psychologist Stanley Milgram . Milgram is best known for his famous obedience experiment , and Zimbardo was interested in expanding upon Milgram's research. He wanted to further investigate the impact of situational variables on human behavior.

Specifically, the researchers wanted to know how participants would react when placed in a simulated prison environment. They wondered if physically and psychologically healthy people who knew they were participating in an experiment would change their behavior in a prison-like setting.

Participants in the Stanford Prison Experiment

To carry out the experiment, researchers set up a mock prison in the basement of Stanford University's psychology building. They then selected 24 undergraduate students to play the roles of both prisoners and guards.

Participants were chosen from a larger group of 70 volunteers based on having no criminal background, no psychological issues , and no significant medical conditions. Each volunteer agreed to participate in the Stanford Prison Experiment for one to two weeks in exchange for $15 a day.

Setting and Procedures

The simulated prison included three six-by-nine-foot prison cells. Each cell held three prisoners and included three cots. Other rooms across from the cells were utilized for the jail guards and warden. One tiny space was designated as the solitary confinement room, and yet another small room served as the prison yard.

The 24 volunteers were randomly assigned to either the prisoner or guard group. Prisoners were to remain in the mock prison 24 hours a day during the study. Guards were assigned to work in three-man teams for eight-hour shifts. After each shift, they were allowed to return to their homes until their next shift.

Researchers were able to observe the behavior of the prisoners and guards using hidden cameras and microphones.

Results of the Stanford Prison Experiment

So what happened in the Zimbardo experiment? While originally slated to last 14 days, it had to be stopped after just six due to what was happening to the student participants. The guards became abusive and the prisoners began to show signs of extreme stress and anxiety .

It was noted that:

• While the prisoners and guards were allowed to interact in any way they wanted, the interactions were hostile or even dehumanizing.
• The guards began to become aggressive and abusive toward the prisoners while the prisoners became passive and depressed.
• Five of the prisoners began to experience severe negative emotions , including crying and acute anxiety, and had to be released from the study early.

Even the researchers themselves began to lose sight of the reality of the situation. Zimbardo, who acted as the prison warden, overlooked the abusive behavior of the jail guards until graduate student Christina Maslach voiced objections to the conditions in the simulated prison and the morality of continuing the experiment.

One possible explanation for the results of this experiment is the idea of deindividuation , which states that being part of a large group can make us more likely to perform behaviors we would otherwise not do on our own.

Impact of the Zimbardo Prison Experiment

The experiment became famous and was widely cited in textbooks and other publications. According to Zimbardo and his colleagues, the Stanford Prison Experiment demonstrated the powerful role that the situation can play in human behavior.

Because the guards were placed in a position of power, they began to behave in ways they would not usually act in their everyday lives or other situations. The prisoners, placed in a situation where they had no real control , became submissive and depressed.

In 2011, the Stanford Alumni Magazine featured a retrospective of the Stanford Prison Experiment in honor of the experiment’s 40th anniversary. The article contained interviews with several people involved, including Zimbardo and other researchers as well as some of the participants.

In the interviews, Richard Yacco, one of the prisoners in the experiment, suggested that the experiment demonstrated the power that societal roles and expectations can play in a person's behavior.

In 2015, the experiment became the topic of a feature film titled The Stanford Prison Experiment that dramatized the events of the 1971 study.

Criticisms of the Stanford Prison Experiment

In the years since the experiment was conducted, there have been a number of critiques of the study. Some of these include:

Ethical Issues

The Stanford Prison Experiment is frequently cited as an example of unethical research. It could not be replicated by researchers today because it fails to meet the standards established by numerous ethical codes, including the Code of Ethics of the American Psychological Association .

Why was Zimbardo's experiment unethical?

Zimbardo's experiment was unethical due to a lack of fully informed consent, abuse of participants, and lack of appropriate debriefings. More recent findings suggest there were other significant ethical issues that compromise the experiment's scientific standing, including the fact that experimenters may have encouraged abusive behaviors.

Lack of Generalizability

Other critics suggest that the study lacks generalizability due to a variety of factors. The unrepresentative sample of participants (mostly white and middle-class males) makes it difficult to apply the results to a wider population.

Lack of Realism

The Zimbardo Prison Experiment is also criticized for its lack of ecological validity. Ecological validity refers to the degree of realism with which a simulated experimental setup matches the real-world situation it seeks to emulate.

While the researchers did their best to recreate a prison setting, it is simply not possible to perfectly mimic all the environmental and situational variables of prison life. Because there may have been factors related to the setting and situation that influenced how the participants behaved, it may not truly represent what might happen outside of the lab.

Recent Criticisms

More recent examination of the experiment's archives and interviews with participants have revealed major issues with the research method , design, and procedures used. Together, these call the study's validity, value, and even authenticity into question.

These reports, including examinations of the study's records and new interviews with participants, have also cast doubt on some of its key findings and assumptions.

Among the issues described:

• One participant suggested that he faked a breakdown so he could leave the experiment because he was worried about failing his classes.
• Other participants also reported altering their behavior in a way designed to "help" the experiment .
• Evidence suggests that the experimenters encouraged the guards' behavior and played a role in fostering the abusive actions of the guards.

In 2019, the journal American Psychologist published an article debunking the famed experiment. It detailed the study's lack of scientific merit and concluded that the Stanford Prison Experiment was "an incredibly flawed study that should have died an early death."

In a statement posted on the experiment's official website, Zimbardo maintains that these criticisms do not undermine the main conclusion of the study—that situational forces can alter individual actions both in positive and negative ways.

The Stanford Prison Experiment is well known both inside and outside the field of psychology . While the study has long been criticized for many reasons, more recent criticisms of the study's procedures shine a brighter light on the experiment's scientific shortcomings.

Stanford University. About the Stanford Prison Experiment .

Stanford Prison Experiment. 2. Setting up .

Sommers T. An interview with Philip Zimbardo . The Believer.

Ratnesar R. The menace within . Stanford Magazine.

Jabbar A, Muazzam A, Sadaqat S. An unveiling the ethical quandaries: A critical analysis of the Stanford Prison Experiment as a mirror of Pakistani society . J Bus Manage Res . 2024;3(1):629-638.

Horn S. Landmark Stanford Prison Experiment criticized as a sham . Prison Legal News .

Bartels JM. The Stanford Prison Experiment in introductory psychology textbooks: A content analysis .  Psychol Learn Teach . 2015;14(1):36-50. doi:10.1177/1475725714568007

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Blum B. The lifespan of a lie . Medium .

Le Texier T. Debunking the Stanford Prison Experiment . Am Psychol . 2019;74(7):823-839. doi:10.1037/amp0000401

Stanford Prison Experiment. Philip Zimbardo's response to recent criticisms of the Stanford Prison Experiment .

By Kendra Cherry, MSEd Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

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Stanford Prison Experiment

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• BBC News - Stanford prison experiment continues to shock
• Official Site of Stanford Prison Experiment
• Grand Valley State University - Twenty-Five Years after the Stanford Prison Experiment
• American Psychological Association - Demonstrating the Power of Social Situations via a Simulated Prison Experiment
• Verywell Mind - The Stanford Prison Experiment
• Stanford Libraries - Stanford Prison Experiment
• Simply Psychology - Stanford Prison Experiment: Zimbardo’s Famous Study
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Stanford Prison Experiment , a social psychology study in which college students became prisoners or guards in a simulated prison environment . The experiment, funded by the U.S. Office of Naval Research, took place at Stanford University in August 1971. It was intended to measure the effect of role-playing, labeling, and social expectations on behaviour over a period of two weeks. However, mistreatment of prisoners escalated so alarmingly that principal investigator Philip G. Zimbardo terminated the experiment after only six days.

More than 70 young men responded to an advertisement about a “psychological study of prison life,” and experimenters selected 24 applicants who were judged to be physically and mentally healthy. The paid subjects—they received $15 a day—were divided randomly into equal numbers of guards and prisoners. Guards were ordered not to physically abuse prisoners and were issued mirrored sunglasses that prevented any eye contact. Prisoners were “arrested” by actual police and handed over to the experimenters in a mock prison in the basement of a campus building. Prisoners were then subjected to indignities that were intended to simulate the environment of a real-life prison. In keeping with Zimbardo’s intention to create very quickly an “atmosphere of oppression,” each prisoner was made to wear a “dress” as a uniform and to carry a chain padlocked around one ankle. All participants were observed and videotaped by the experimenters.

On only the second day the prisoners staged a rebellion. Guards then worked out a system of rewards and punishments to manage the prisoners. Within the first four days, three prisoners had become so traumatized that they were released. Over the course of the experiment, some of the guards became cruel and tyrannical, while a number of the prisoners became depressed and disoriented. However, only after an outside observer came upon the scene and registered shock did Zimbardo conclude the experiment, less than a week after it had started.

The Stanford Prison Experiment immediately came under attack on methodological and ethical grounds. Zimbardo admitted that during the experiment he had sometimes felt more like a prison superintendent than a research psychologist. Later on, he claimed that the experiment’s “social forces and environmental contingencies” had led the guards to behave badly. However, others claimed that the original advertisement attracted people who were predisposed to authoritarianism . The most conspicuous challenge to the Stanford findings came decades later in the form of the BBC Prison Study, a differently organized experiment documented in a British Broadcasting Corporation series called The Experiment (2002). The BBC’s mock prisoners turned out to be more assertive than Zimbardo’s. The British experimenters called the Stanford experiment “a study of what happens when a powerful authority figure (Zimbardo) imposes tyranny.”

The Stanford Prison Experiment became widely known outside academia . It was the acknowledged inspiration for Das Experiment (2001), a German movie that was remade in the United States as the direct-to-video film The Experiment (2010). The Stanford Prison Experiment (2015) was created with Zimbardo’s active participation; the dramatic film more closely followed actual events.

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In This Article Expand or collapse the "in this article" section Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE): Icon and Controversy

Introduction, archival sources.

• Primary Documentation of the SPE
• Biographical Background
• SPE and Related Experiments in Media
• SPE in Textbooks, Handbooks, and Histories of Psychology
• Replication of the SPE and Related Replications
• Psychological Prison and Punishment Literature Related to the SPE
• Methodological Criticisms
• Ethical Criticisms
• Thibault Le Texier

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Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE): Icon and Controversy by David C. Devonis LAST REVIEWED: 26 August 2020 LAST MODIFIED: 26 August 2020 DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199828340-0269

The Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) took place at a time when the sources of authoritarianism and evil were a focal concern in psychology. It emerged from a tradition of activist social psychological research beginning with Solomon Asch in the 1940s and extending through Stanley Milgram’s obedience experiments in the early 1960s. The SPE was a product of the research program of social psychologist Philip Zimbardo, a member of the Stanford psychology faculty since 1968. Discussions among Zimbardo’s students in spring 1971 led to a plan to simulate a prison environment. They converted portions of the basement of a University building into a combination booking room and jail. Zimbardo and a number of his graduate and undergraduate students took on supervisory roles. Before the Experiment began, paid participants recruited through newspaper advertisements were screened to eliminate obvious psychopathology, then randomly assigned to either the role of ‘guard’ or ‘prisoner.’ On the first experimental morning August 14, 1971, actual local police simulated an arrest of each of the prisoner participants. After they arrived, blindfolded, a simulated booking took place. Guards escorted them to the prison hallway where prisoners were required to strip and exchange their clothing for simple shifts and slippers. After a simulated spray delousing, they entered makeshift cells. After this, the Experiment evolved as an extended improvisation, by both the guards and prisoners, on prison-related themes. Episodes of deprivation, bullying, and humiliation emerged unplanned. Originally planned to run for two weeks, the Experiment lasted only six days, prematurely terminated when its supervising personnel judged that the simulation had gotten out of their control. The coincidence of its termination with the Attica prison uprising in New York led to its immediate dissemination in the news. Since then the SPE has become one of the most iconic psychological studies of psychology’s modern era. Although intended to expose and ameliorate bad prison conditions, its effectiveness in this regard diminished during a rapid shift in US prison policy, in the mid-1970’s, from reform to repression. Over succeeding decades, the Experiment continued to stimulate the popular imagination, leading to an extensive replication on British television and its portrayal in two feature films. Soon after its original publication, the SPE attracted criticisms of its methodology. After 2010, critical scrutiny of the SPE as well as similar iconic studies from the 1960s and 1970s increased, fueled by the growing ‘replication crisis’ in psychology. This most recent phase of criticism reflects not just a turn toward reflexive disciplinary self-criticism but also the increased availability of archival sources for examination. The SPE continues to excite both passionate support and equally passionate obloquy, much as have other comparable simulations of human social behavior.

Philip Zimbardo, the primary investigator of the SPE, has been unusually generous in making archival donations during his lifetime. Two of these are physical archives in two different locations: the Zimbardo (Philip G.) Papers at the Stanford University Archives and the Philip Zimbardo Papers at the Drs. Nicholas and Dorothy Cummings Center for the History of Psychology (CCHP) at the University of Akron. Alongside these is a virtual archive, the Stanford Prison Experiment website, maintained for over twenty years by Zimbardo and others. The Stanford Prison Experiment: 40 Years Later , a website constructed by the Stanford University archivist in connection with an exhibition at Stanford, contains links to much of the transcribed data collected by Zimbardo and his colleagues in 1971. Le Texier 2018 and Le Texier 2019 (cited under Thibault Le Texier ) represent the most complete use of the archives to date, and citations in these critiques of the SPE form a virtual finding aid for the many subdivisions of the available archival material.

Philip Zimbardo Papers. Drs. Nicholas and Dorothy Cummings Center for the History of Psychology (CCHP). Univ. of Akron, Akron, Ohio.

This collection, a subset (4.5 linear feet in 16 boxes) of the Stanford Zimbardo archive, is focused on the SPE. It contains SPE-specific materials, teaching materials, and materials relating to the development of Zimbardo 2008 (cited under Primary Documentation of the SPE ). The CCHP also holds several oversize folders of SPE materials and has some of the original props and costumes from the SPE. The finding aid also has a brief Zimbardo biography. The finding aid is available online .

The Stanford Prison Experiment .

Well-designed and informative website, maintained with National Science Foundation (NSF) funding under sponsorship of the Social Psychology Network, with links to much of the primary documentary and contextual material relating to the SPE as well as to major media presentations of the Experiment. Historically it evolved from the original slide show Zimbardo and White 1972 (cited under SPE and Related Experiments in Media ) circulated among social psychologists in the 1970s.

The Stanford Prison Experiment: 40 Years Later In Stanford Libraries: Special Collections and University Archives .

This site contains copies of material related to the SPE from the Stanford Archives, including accessible transcripts of several documents related to the SPE such as the original informed consent forms, audio clips, and photos, as well as links to the original eighty-slide slideshow from the 1970s.

Zimbardo (Philip G.) Papers. Stanford University Archives, Collection SC0750.

This collection runs 256 linear feet in 182 boxes, and contains material directly and peripherally related to the SPE, including a substantial amount of audiovisual and film material and materials used in Zimbardo’s classes at Stanford. The finding aid, available online , has a brief Zimbardo biography attached.

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Stanford Prison Experiment

• Quiet Rage: The Stanford Prison Experiment

About the Stanford Prison Experiment

Carried out August 15-21, 1971 in the basement of Jordan Hall, the Stanford Prison Experiment set out to examine the psychological effects of authority and powerlessness in a prison environment. The study, led by psychology professor Philip G. Zimbardo, recruited Stanford students using a local newspaper ad. Twenty-four students were carefully screened and randomly assigned into groups of prisoners and guards. The experiment, which was scheduled to last 1-2 weeks, ultimately had to be terminated on only the 6th day as the experiment escalated out of hand when the prisoners were forced to endure cruel and dehumanizing abuse at the hands of their peers. The experiment showed, in Dr. Zimbardo’s words, how “ordinary college students could do terrible things.”

This exhibit includes documentation of the experiment, including images and audiovisual recordings, that some viewers may find disturbing. Viewer discretion is advised.

Samples from the Collection

Photographs

Video Recordings

Transcripts