The Stanford County prison experiments were conducted in the 1970s by a psychologist at Stanford named Philip Zimbardo. Zimbardo was interested in whether or not the people who went to prison were inherently bad, deviant, aggressive people filled with rage, or whether the prison institution itself promoted these kind of behaviors amongst inmates and guards.
Did the fact of being in the physical space of prison make guards more sadistic and aggressive? Did it make prisoners deviant? Did it make them misbehave?
Philip Zimbardo was actually asking a question about the institution of prison.
IN CONTEXT
Zimbardo got a group of 24 clinically sane young men to take part in his prison experiment. He assigned 12 of them to the guard group and the other 12 to the prisoner group.
People knew they were taking part in this study, but those in the prisoner group didn't know when they were going to be 'taken' to prison. Zimbardo arrested them by surprise. It was very official, and he tried to make it as realistic as possible--they were arrested, taken to the prison, stripped, given uniforms, numbers, etc. The guards had whistles and uniforms, too.
As soon as he got the prisoners in and the guards set up, Zimbardo started cameras rolling and observed. The experiment was supposed to last two weeks, but it got so ugly that he was forced to cut the experiment short after only six days.
As soon as prisoners got in there, the guards became sadistic and hostile, forcing the prisoners to do demeaning, effacing things like clean toilets with their bare hands, etc. In response to their new situation, prisoners became sad and depressed; some cried, and some became angry and hostile at the guards.
Normal, clinically sane people in both groups started to act insane when thrown into this situation.
The Stanford County prison experiment illustrates what you're not supposed to do when experimenting with human subjects. It violates what we call informed consent, which states that when you're doing research with human subjects, everyone must be notified in advance of all the responsibilities and potential risks and dangers of the study.
You can't do as Zimbardo did and pull people out of their homes, put them in a mock prison and deprive them of the basics, without their knowledge or consent.
Source: This work is adapted from Sophia author Zach Lamb.