It also provoked criticism from other researchers, who questioned the ethics of subjecting student volunteers to such extreme emotional trauma. The public's fascination with the SPE and its implications-the notion, as Zimbardo says, "that these ordinary college students could do such terrible things when caught in that situation"-brought Zimbardo international renown. As the situation descended into chaos, the researchers stood by and watched-until one of their colleagues finally spoke out. Some of them rebelled violently others became hysterical or withdrew into despair. At various times, they were taunted, stripped naked, deprived of sleep and forced to use plastic buckets as toilets. For six days, half the study's participants endured cruel and dehumanizing abuse at the hands of their peers. But no one knew what, exactly, they were getting into.įorty years later, the Stanford Prison Experiment remains among the most notable-and notorious-research projects ever carried out at the University. The study began on Sunday, August 17, 1971. He made clear that prisoners could not be physically harmed, but said the guards should try to create an atmosphere in which the prisoners felt "powerless." Zimbardo encouraged the guards to think of themselves as actual guards in a real prison.
He and his fellow researchers selected 24 applicants and randomly assigned each to be a prisoner or a guard. The leader of the study was 38-year-old psychology professor Philip Zimbardo. More than 70 people volunteered to take part in the study, to be conducted in a fake prison housed inside Jordan Hall, on Stanford's Main Quad. Male college students needed for psychological study of prison life.
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