Week 2: Stanford Experiment

I'm not sure whether or not the Stanford Prison Experiment was ethical. After reading about it, I'm kind of undecided. All the students were told about the experiment. They knew what they were doing. Of course, the setting that they were in made them forget that it was all an experiment. It made these students believe that they were really prison guards and prisoners. As I sit here reading my notes about this experiment, I believe it started out as an ethical experiment. As the experiment progressed, the students turned it into an unethical experiment. I think that as soon as the guards started abusing their power, the experiment should have been ended. Luckily enough for the "prisoners," the experiment was stopped before the guards went even further with their abuse and torture. It did become an unethical experiment when the guards overstepped their boundaries. If the people in charge of the experiment kept these "guards" under control, then it would have been an ethical experiment. If they had been kept under control, they wouldn't have gone to the extreme forms of punishment that they resorted to.

As far as interesting, I found it interesting how quickly the students assumed their roles as guards and prisoners. It's amazing how our mind works. The students who were guards quickly adapted to their position and started abusing their power. The students who were prisoners also began rebelling as if they were really imprisoned.