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Start of experiment
The experiment was conducted at Stanford University by a team of researchers led by psychology professor Philip Zimbardo with the aim to investigate how readily people would conform to the roles of guard and prisoner in a role-playing exercise that simulated prison life. -
Guards
Guards were issued a khaki uniform, with whistles, handcuffs and dark glasses, to make eye contact with prisoners impossible. -
Period: to
The Stanford Prison Experiment
This study was funded by the US Navy, as it and the US Marine Corps were interested in finding out the causes of conflict between guards and prisoners in the naval prisons. -
Arrest
Prisoners were arrested at their own homes, without warning, and taken to the local police station. There they were fingerprinted, photographed and ‘booked’. Then they were blindfolded and driven to the psychology department of Stanford University, where Zimbardo had had the basement set out as a prison. they were stripped naked, deloused, had all their personal possessions removed and locked away, and were given prison clothes and bedding. They were issued a uniform. -
Few hours in guards
Within hours of beginning the experiment some guards began to harass prisoners. They behaved in a brutal and sadistic manner, apparently enjoying it. Other guards joined in, and other prisoners were also tormented. The prisoners were taunted with insults and petty orders, they were given pointless and boring tasks to accomplish, and they were generally dehumanized. -
Few hours in prisoners
The prisoners soon adopted prisoner-like behavior too. They talked about prison issues a great deal of the time. They ‘told tales’ on each other to the guards. They started taking the prison rules very seriously, as though they were there for the prisoners’ benefit and infringement would spell disaster for all of them. Some even began siding with the guards against prisoners who did not conform to the rules. -
Rebellion
Barricaded themselves into their cells, ripped off their prisoner ID numbers from the front of their smocks, and threw down their stocking caps. They also teased and taunted the guards to their faces – from the safety of their cells -
First Prisoner Release
His thinking became disorganized and he appeared to be entering the early stages of a deep depression. -
Submission
As the prisoners became more dependent, the guards became more derisive towards them. They held the prisoners in contempt and let the prisoners know it. As the guards’ contempt for them grew, the prisoners became more submissive.
As the prisoners became more submissive, the guards became more aggressive and assertive. They demanded ever greater obedience from the prisoners. The prisoners were dependent on the guards for everything so tried to find ways to please the guards, such as telling ta -
Suspected Attack
some of the guards stated that they heard a rumor that the released prisoner was going to come back with his friends and free the remaining inmates. Zimbardo and the guards disassembled the prison and moved it onto a different floor of the building. Zimbardo himself waited in the basement, in case the released prisoner showed up, and planned to tell him that the experiment had been terminated. The released prisoner never returned, and the prison was rebuilt in the basement once again. -
End of experiement
Zimbardo aborted the experiment early when Christina Maslach, a graduate student in psychology whom he was dating objected to the conditions of the prison after she was introduced to the experiment to conduct interviews. After only six days of a planned two weeks' duration, the Stanford Prison experiment was discontinued. Data collected were combinations of both quantitative and qualitative data. Data collected was qualitative and was obtained using video, audiotape and direct observation