The Pros And Cons Of The Zimbardo Experiment

The Zimbardo experiment was one that overseer even saw that it was unethical after coming to his senses. He put an ad in the newspaper for college students to submit for the experiment, where twenty-four would be chosen. The students would be paid fifteen dollars per day for two weeks of the experiment. However, it did not even last one week. It was an attempt of “good triumphs” in a negative environment, which did not work within the students’ roles. The guards became abusive, the prisoners started to rebel, and it did not stop because Zimbardo gave himself a role with the guards. The clips and descriptions of the experiment’s results were one of the most shocking things I have ever seen or heard, although I had read a paragraph about the same experiment prior to taking this course. Unethical was an understatement, as prisoners would go crazy. “F___ your experiment! F____ your simulation!” was one statement from a prisoner, whom said that they had never screamed so loud in his life, and that he had never felt that much emotion in his life. As I can find no other way of explaining it, I told some of my friends online that it was “all kinds of messed up.” Students chosen for the Zimbardo experiment were given props: the prison guards were given batons, mirrored sunglasses, and uniforms while the prisoners

It only lasted six days, and this was when a graduate student was invited to watch with Zimbardo. She told him to look at what it was doing to those boys. At that moment, he has some sense knocked into him. “I should have had someone else act as the dean, or have another sociologist watch when I had the role.” There was no earlier intervention because he was into his role as well, but after the graduate student mentioned to him that it was needed, he immediately terminated the experiment on the sixth day. Zimbardo’s experiment did not even last a week, as he realized how unethical it