Looking at the Stanford Prison Experiment this week was interesting but perplexing. I had heard many details about the experiment previously, but it was interesting to hear it from Zimbardo himself, and the way he saw this experiment. Putting aside the shocking lack of proper ethics used in this experiment, there seems to be one issue in the way the experiment was set up. Zimbardo hints that he expected the guards in his study to abuse their position of power to oppress and harass the prisoners. The idea of demand characteristics was brought up in our class discussion, and it had been something I had wondered when reading about the experiment. Did the orientation that the guards received when entering the experiment shape the way the guards mistreated the prisoners? Despite the ambiguity that was supposed to be created in the role of the guards, there may have been just enough of a suggestion that the guards could harass and demean the prisoners in order to create a sense of authority and order among the prisoners.
A series of studies by Bartels (2019) examined the effects of a prison guard orientation on the expected behavior of participants who were assigned as guards in a hypothetical recreation of the Stanford Prison Experiment. For each study, a group of men were recruited and told that they were assigned to be guards in the study and were given one of two orientations. The first orientation, referred to as the Stanford group, were told some of the expectations for guards and prisoners, such that guards can create boredom, frustration, and fear, and the prisoners would not take things seriously. In comparison, the control group was told about the provision such as the food given to prisoners, and the living arrangements of the guards and prisoners. When asked about the expected behavior of the guards, those in the Stanford group expected more negative behavior, such as oppression and hostility from both themselves and from other guards, and expected less positive behavior, such as being friendly or fair. They also reported that the experimenters expected more negative behavior from the guards. These results were replicated in a second, identical study. In the last study, they added more information about the prisoners to each group, such as the smocks and nylon caps they would wear, and that they would be placed in cells with chains on their ankles. They were also showed a scenario where prisoners were provoking the guards and laughing when they were supposed to be reciting the rules, as occurred in the actual Stanford experiment, and asked how they would respond. Those in the Stanford group were more likely to respond with hostility or anger than those in the control group. This study shows the importance of removing the expectations of the experimenters to prevent influencing the behavior of the participants. This also questions the validity of the Stanford Prison Experiment.
If demand characteristics were not involved in the way that the guards acted, then where did they get this idea of an abusive prison guard? Out of those locked up in prison and those ensuring their detainment, how are the guards the ones who were the perpetrators of abuse, and the prisoners became the victim. Shows like Orange is The New Black show that there are prison guards who go mad with power, but there are those who see the prisoners as people and treat them as such, despite the pressure to maintain authority, such as. Has the media created a hostile image of prison guards, did the ‘guards’ take advantage of their position of power, were they just bored and used the prisoners for their entertainment, or were they acting according to what they thought Zimbardo expected from them? There are multiple factors that could have led to such a concerning conclusion to the experiment.
Bartels, J. (2019). Revisiting the stanford prison experiment, again: Examining demand characteristics in the guard orientation. The Journal of Social Psychology, 159(6), 780-790. doi:http://dx.doi.org.proxy1.lib.trentu.ca/10.1080/00224545.2019.1596058
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