The Stanford prison experiment

The young man put on his uniform without much thought. A beige T-shirt, simple pants, a number on his chest. It was just a game, a university study. But as soon as he looked in the mirror, something in his identity shattered: he ceased to be himself and became Prisoner 8612.

On the other side, another young man was adjusting his reflective sunglasses and trying on a rubber baton. He wasn't a police officer; he'd never had authority over anyone. However, when he put on a blue uniform and was ordered to maintain order, he felt he could do anything.

What none of them knew was that the experiment, designed to last two weeks, would abruptly end after six days. And that their lives and social psychology would never be the same again.

The Stanford prison experiment

The Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted in 1971 by psychologist Philip Zimbardo at Stanford University to study how power dynamics and social roles could influence human behavior.

• Twenty-four volunteer students were selected, all men, psychologically healthy and with no medical history.
• They were randomly divided into two groups: guards and prisoners.
• The basement of the Psychology Department was transformed into a mock prison, complete with cells, bars, and a surveillance area.

The prisoners were arrested in their own homes by the real Palo Alto police and taken hooded to the makeshift prison. There, they were assigned numbers and simple uniforms, losing their personal identity.

The guards, on the other hand, received military uniforms, mirrored sunglasses (to depersonalize their gaze) and rubber batons.

What began as an academic simulation quickly degenerated into abuse.

• Within 48 hours, the guards began to display authoritarian behavior, humiliating and punishing the prisoners.
• The prisoners, for their part, entered states of anxiety, depression and submission.
• One of them (prisoner 8612) suffered an emotional breakdown and had to be released.

Zimbardo himself, who assumed the role of prison warden, became absorbed in the experiment and allowed the abuse to continue.

The study, planned for two weeks, was canceled on the sixth day due to the intervention of Christina Maslach, Zimbardo's psychologist and partner, who, upon seeing the situation, denounced the seriousness of what was happening.

Repercussions and criticisms

The experiment became a classic of social psychology, but also one of the most controversial.

• Results: demonstrated how ordinary people could become executioners or victims by assuming roles of power or submission.
• Methodological criticisms: Over time, the scientific validity of the experiment has been questioned. Some argue that the guards acted more as "interpreters" than expected, and that Zimbardo actively influenced their behavior.
• Ethics: The experiment marked a turning point in the regulation of human studies. The lack of limits and the suffering of the participants sparked an international debate on ethics in psychological research.

Conclusions of the phenomenon

The experiment left several disturbing lessons:

• Social roles can radically transform behavior. Ordinary people can become aggressors or victims depending on the role assigned to them.
• Power dehumanizes if it's unchecked. Unchecked authority can quickly lead to abuse.
• Context weighs more than personality. What we are capable of depends, in large part, on the circumstances in which we are placed.

Final reflection

The Stanford prison experiment is a dark warning: under the right conditions, any of us could become guard or prisoner, oppressor or victim. These are not exceptional monsters, but ordinary people trapped in a context that distorts their humanity.

Today, in a society where power remains concentrated in institutions, governments, and corporations, the lesson remains: the line between civilization and barbarism is thinner than we like to believe.

Perhaps the real prison isn't in the basements of Stanford, but in our ability to relinquish critical judgment when a uniform or an order tells us what to do.

References

Haney, C., Banks, C., & Zimbardo, P. G. (1973). Interpersonal dynamics in a simulated prison . International Journal of Criminology and Penology, 1, 69–97.

Zimbardo, P. (2007). The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil . Random House.

Le Texier, T. (2019). Debunking the Stanford Prison Experiment . American Psychologist, 74(7), 823–839. https://doi.org/10.1037/amp0000401