A Prison by Any Other Name
This research was performed by Philip Zimbardo. This study was performed because they wanted to know the psychological effects while inmates spent time incarcerated. Zimbardo’s hypothesis was “the environment around you, the situation, often determines how you behave more strongly than who you are- that is, your internal dispositional nature” (Zimbardo, 1973, Pg. 285).
This research was an experiment. The independent variable is the environment and conditions that the guards and prisoners were in, either in the cells or walking the hallway. The dependent variable is how the inmates started to react due to being locked up and how the guards started to treat the inmates. Zimbardo wanted to know how being incarcerated effects an inmate’s personality. He also wanted to see if their personality changed due to the environment they were in or if the environment would bring out their true inner personality. They collected their data by setting cameras up where no one would be able to see and recorded how the college students performed their role as a guard or as an inmate.
. Zimbardo put an ad out in the newspaper offering people to experience prison life for $15 to help with a psychology study. They ended up getting quite a few of applicants to participate in this research; they chose 24 college students which were randomly selected to be either an inmate or a prison guard. To create a realistic prison they converted the basement of Stanford University. The set up for the prison was the class room as the inmates’ cells and they made the doors with vertical bars to replicate what an inmate would have to deal with. To replicate the solitary confinement, like the prisons have, they used the closet that was at the end of the hallway. For the prison yard they used the hallway where they can exit the cells, eat their food, and socialize with other inmates. Zimbardo had actual police arrest the college students that would be the prisoners and bring them to his prison in the basement of Stanford University. Zimbardo then had the college students, which were going to be the guards, pat them down and put them into their cells. He gave them no instructions on how to react to the inmates. Zimbardo played the role as the warden and sat back watching how the inmates and the guards reacted to the prison life. In the research article “Zimbardo- Stanford Prison experiment,” they said, “there were 3 guards to 9 prisoners, taking shifts of eight hours each while the other guards remained on call.”(Saul McLeod, 2008, Zimbardo- Stanford Prison Experiment) This research was supposed to last for two weeks but only lasted six days. Zimbardo ended the research early because both the inmates and guards were really getting into their role that they were supposed to play, including Zimbardo. The inmates would beg to be released on parole but the guards would say no and they would go back to their cells. Even when they would go back to their cells they were told before the research that they could leave at any time they feel like it. At times Zimbardo would forget that it was a research and was playing his role as a warden and watching over his prison.
The research findings are important in today’s society because by reviewing this study they are able to come to a conclusion that people react differently when they are in an unfamiliar environment. You could use this information to help better understand how people react and change due to the different environment. By knowing this knowledge you can try and help rehabilitate people while they’re incarcerated for the change outside the walls.
The connection from the research “A Prison by Any Other Name” to the Psychology book is the discriminative stimulus. In the Special Edition for Delta Psychology it has the defined Discriminative Stimulus as “any stimulus, such as a stop sign or a doorknob that provides the organism with a cue for making a certain response in order to obtain reinforcement.” The guards at the prison used this stimulus to show they were in charge by refusing to let the inmates to be released on parole. Also, some guards made the inmates clean the bathroom with their bare hands because they knew they could get away with it; they were the law there.
I can use the information from this research by knowing that while I go into law enforcement that you can easily change because you have the authority to make people do things that a citizen couldn’t do. While you’re on the job you can act one way but when you’re off duty you can completely act differently. Therefore, it is important to notice that people can change due to the environment they are dealing with on a daily basis. So when I join the police force I need to keep in mind that even though I have the authority to order a citizen or an inmate to do something that I should still keep my morals and not change.
Work Cited
Roger Hock (2013). Forty Studies That Change Psychology Explorations into the History of Psychological Research. NJ: Pearson Education
Saundra K, Ciccarelli J, Noland White (2014). Psychology: Special Edition for Delta Psychology. NJ: Prentice Hall
McLeod, S.A (2008). Zimbardo- Stanford Prison Experiment. Retrieved from http://www.simplypsychology.org/zimbardo.html