The Stanford Prison Experiment by Dr. Philip Zimbardo

The Stanford Prison Experiment by Dr. Philip Zimbardo 
Background
The Stanford Prison Experiment is a widely known experimental research conducted by Dr. Philip Zimbardo at Stanford University from August 14 to August 20, 1971. The social psychology experiment was set to last for two weeks but was terminated within six days. The study was about the psychology of imprisonment, and the study was conducted with college students as "prisoners" or "guards" and actual police as those who arrested them (Zimbardo et al., 1971). It was hypothesized in the experiment that the psychology of imprisonment involves the abusive behaviors of guards and the personality traits of both prisoners and guards. Involving actual police gave the students actual experiences of being prisoners from capture until imprisonment. To make the experience more "authentic," the researchers hired an ex-convict, Carlo Prescott, to consult with the experiment (Zimbardo et al., 1971).
During the experiment, the students assigned as "prisoners" were subjected to different degrees of psychological torture, primarily through common humiliation events experienced by regular prisoners, as described by Mr. Prescott and as applied in the experiment for a more authentic experience of imprisonment. These humiliations involved being picked up in their homes, cuffed and spread-eagled against the police car, formally booked, blindfolded, stripping, de-lousing, head-shaving, and other humiliating acts. Because the participants assigned to be guards immediately assumed an authoritarian character and embraced their roles, possibly taking them too far, some of the subjects withdrew from the experiment, leading to the eventual termination of the entire experiment on August 20.
Consequences and Risks faced by those Involved
Based on the details of the experiment and the experiment narration by Zimbardo et al. (1971), the possibility of psychological trauma was the immediate consequences and risks faced by all participants, regardless of designation. For the guards, there was reported to be trauma in the sense of their selves and how the participants designated as "guards" found their roles very troubling and very uncharacteristic of themselves, bordering on them getting a feeling that they were losing their sense of selves (Scott-Bottoms, 2020). Due to the nature of the prison system in 1971 and even admittedly, until now, prisoners were being treated inhumanely by guards, and in the exp...