Take his survey if you like, but run away fast if he invites you to live in his basement.

Zimbardo is a fraud.

Do tell?

Amayain,

Would you like to back that up with some facts?

Or even some specifics to the "fraud" allegation?

I think the Stanford prison experiment was stupid. If Zimbardo wanted to study prisons or prisoners or guards he could have just studied the prisons around the world that already existed. His experiment was shoddy and unnecessary.

At #6. You need to look into Zimbardo's Stanford experiment a little more. Seems you missed the point a bit. It wasn't just a study of the prison system. It was a study of how normal people act when put in positions of power in extreme situations. It showed how normal people can become tyrants or abusers when put in horrible situations. It used the prison model as the scenario. For more information, go to www.prisonexp.org.

The word for that is role playing, not science.

An alternate take on Zimbardo and his famous experiment can be found here.

I don't know about these "fraud" allegations. But to me that guy looks just like a cartoon devil. Or perhaps a rapier-wielding Spaniard badguy.

Who else filled out the survey? I tended to rate war heroism lower than, say, the couple who saved another couple from being beaten with a pipe. Why is that?

pretty interesting thing to study. Two of the most famous psych experiments of the 20th century showed that people can do evil with very little provocation. there was Zimbardo's prison experiment, and Millgram's authority experiments, where subjects were willing to apparently shock a man to death when they were told to. But maybe not enough attention has been paid to the outliers who didn't go along with the program. After all there was a minority who refused to administer the "lethal" shocks. And Zimbardo's assistant (later his wife) was the one who said, "it's terrible what you're doing to those boys"--which upset him deeply enough that he ended the experiment.

It's easy to call him a "fraud" if you think his work isn't sufficiently rigorous, or make fun of his crazy mephisto facial hair, but if you want to understand why the US has rolled over and accepted the status quo with nary a peep (Gitmo, continual surveillance, dads with spine cancer dying in immigrant detention with no medical help)..."The Lucifer Effect" is an important book to read.

The 'counter-interpretation's primary assertion is that 'most guards didn't participate'. This is terribly flawed. While they may not have engaged in active abuse, every one of them stood by and allowed it to happen, and further, 'John Wayne' abused multiple prisoners to the point of breakdown and past with no censure or intervention. That is a HELL of a lot more than 'playing a role'. Further, every member of the study was profiled and tested before being selected. None had a history of mental illness, or violence, or profoundly unusual events in their lives.

Additionally, he floats the absurd notion that the study was flawed simply because the researcher had a theory he was testing. In case you forgot, the scientific method works as follows ... formulate a theory ... test the theory ... revise the theory ... repeat. You'll notice that the first part requires an expected outcome. If this alone is grounds for suspect conclusions, then all o science is suspect.

Then, he points out the obvious - it would be considered unethical today - as if this somehow invalidated the whole thing. When it was conducted, it didn't violate any ethical standard of the day. It was almost certainly the catalyst for rewriting many of the rules of research, but just like the Milgram study - that we could not ethically repeat them today doesn't make them any less instructive or informative.

What this amounts to is that he doesn't approve of the study, and doesn't agree with it but can summon only cosmetic objections to methodology, and tangential criticisms of the conclusions. He's entitled to his opinion of course, but this definitely does not count as an academically rigorous debunking of the study, nor is it likely to change the consensus opinion of it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment#Criticism_of_the_experiment

There's plenty of very really criticism of the stanford prison experiment. Particularly Zimbardo's role as the superintendent, which essentially dis validates the entire thing scientifically.

Some of the examples presented are so vaguely described there is no way to make a reasonable judgment on whether their actions where heroic or otherwise - Question 2 might as well read 'this man was a spy - is he good or bad?' Then on the other hand we have completely straightforward examples of selflessness that are completely unquantifiable in terms of heroism... man jumps on grenade to save 2 lives.. hmm, not bad - I'll give him a 4.5 - saving a third person would have got him a perfect score though.

Balls.

#11,#14: Could I suggest that detailed discussions of the questionnaire on one of the most-linked to blogs on the Internet is only likely to screw with the survey? (Whatever you may think of it or Zimbardo's rigour.)

I think it is ironic that a very well established researcher like Zimbardo would have a plea put out on his behalf for research subjects to take his survey for free because he "needs us". This I think is a self serving manipulation of the concept of helpfulness ... remember that professors like Zimbardo usually get grants to pay subjects to take surveys, as long as they can convince somebody with money that the research is worthwhile. Apparently we should help him because he is FAMOUS? Remember that if we "help" Zimbardo by giving our time freely, we are devaluing the market for paid survey taking, depriving undergraduates from a reliable source of beer (or textbook) money. My solidarity with undergraduates and the up-and-coming researcher leads me to suggest: pass on this.

Eeyore, you seem to be ignoring the most important points of the Skeptoid article's criticism-- that there was selection bias involved, that Zimbardo had a unique opportunity to manipulate the experiment by directly participating as prison superintendent, and that there is not enough evidence to prove whether the prison environment alone turned good people bad, or whether pre-existing personality traits could be blamed. (Sure, the subjects were selected for not having a history of violence or mental illness, but that doesn't mean they were all nice people-- it could be that the lesson to be learned from the experiment was not "harsh environments turn good people bad," but rather "harsh environments can help make bad people even worse".)

Also, I am puzzled by your assertion that the non-abusive guards were guilty because they stood by and allowed the abuse to happen. So, in fact, did Zimbardo! He didn't shut down the experiment until his girlfriend persuaded him to do so, and she was the first observer to find anything unethical about the experiment. So does watching a harsh environment turn you evil as well?

I got to the third page when I noticed that a number of questions are apparently repeated multiple times during the survey. Is this a standard survey technique? What's the point? To see if you've changed your mind in the two minutes since you answered the question the first time?

Hey everyone, sorry to post a second critical comment about this psychological test, but while previous posts have discussed faults in the experimental design of the prison experiment, what about the current test? Isn't this forum in itself causing problems for the assumption of independence between trials? Look at the comments above, and you will see that people who have already taken the survey are writing about their experience. This creates a bias that could influence those who next take the test. This is big no-no for experimental design of most psychological tests. OK, I'll stop my bitching now.

#18: Yes.

I'm only speaking from the perspective of a psychology module taken several years ago, but properly designed surveys have all sorts of checks like this.

Some questions asses the level of (self-)deception involved, by asking questions that they already know the answers to. "Do you ever lie?" is the crude example I can remember.

Others address the same question but ask it in different ways to avoid any bias of language. Also, if you're rating on a scale (1 to 5, most correct to least correct, etc...) the question is phrased so that if you answer consistently you should answer high on one question and low on its partner. This is to get rid of any bias in your reaction to the scale, as people's answers tend to be biased toward the "agree" end for some reason.

Questionnaire design is fascinating stuff, as you need to understand a lot of unconcious biases and linguistic tricks to be good at it. There's much more that what I've written, but I only had two lectures on it and even my memory of those is hazy now.

It's always worth bearing in mind when reading about survey results in the news. Even before the news agency wilfully misinterprets the results to make a better story, an experienced survey writer can make the public say pretty much whatever he wants them to.

Brianwood

Isn't this forum in itself causing problems for the assumption of independence between trials?

Not neccesarily. After all, the button never really shocked people.

Same thing for a test involving heroism/altruism for which one is not compensated - a self selecting data-set may be EXACTLY what he's going for.

Not knowing his intentions is what seems to make so many of you uncomfortable. That and his eyebrows.

#7 said, "It was a study of how normal people act when put in positions of power in extreme situations. It showed how normal people can become tyrants or abusers when put in horrible situations."

Stanley Milgram, experiments done in 61 and 62. http://www.new-life.net/milgram.htm

Remember that if we "help" Zimbardo by giving our time freely, we are devaluing the market for paid survey taking, depriving undergraduates from a reliable source of beer (or textbook) money. My solidarity with undergraduates and the up-and-coming researcher leads me to suggest: pass on this.

Are you kidding me? Seriously? In seven years of secondary education I've never come across someone doing survey research that included payment. If it wasn't for people taking surveys for nothing, most of the qualitative research at my grad school wouldn't get done. Do you think most master or phd students can afford to pay people for this kind of thing? Do you know any researcher who can afford to pay for thing kind of thing?

I mean, if you don't like what the guy has been doing or feel that the study is poorly set up or isn't testing something worthwhile that's one thing. But your survey comment seems weirdly nitpicky and contrary to any experience I've ever had with research using surveys. /anecdote = data

I've sent Amayain a note asking him to come back and expand on his remarks.

BBAteMyName @6, prison systems are full of uncontrolled variables. I don't know where you're getting that "shoddy and unnecessary," unless you're being contrary.

Brianwood1 @16, you're really stretching.

Cholling @17, do you have a scrap of evidence to support that?

...Zimbardo had a unique opportunity to manipulate the experiment by directly participating as prison superintendent

whether pre-existing personality traits could be blamed. (Sure, the subjects were selected for not having a history of violence or mental illness, but that doesn't mean they were all nice people-- it could be that the lesson to be learned from the experiment was not "harsh environments turn good people bad," but rather "harsh environments can help make bad people even worse".)

Joe Mommasan @18, I second Bugs's answer (#20). It's normal to repeat questions in well-constructed surveys and evaluations. It corrects for biases in wording and test formats, and can be a rough gauge of the reliability of the test taker.

Bear in mind that the scientific study of tests and testing is a branch of psychology. Those guys construct sneaky tests. I once had a psych prof who spent the entire last review session before the final discussing all the subjects mentioned in the wrong answers on his multiple-choice test, purely in order to mess up his students' ability to spot correct answers on the basis of having heard them mentioned in class.

Brianwood1 @19: You're still stretching.

To expand on fraud comments:

There were significant criticisms raised about the Standford Prison study. #13 has posted a wiki link that outlines some of them. If you want more, check out the SPSP listserve archives. Social Psychologists had a field day with this one.

But i think more to the point, within the Psychological community, Zimbardo is known for taking a few, relatively narrow studies and making giant bold claims about them. He has claimed that his prison study "proves" that human behavior is completely dictated by the environment/situation. Not only is this rediculous (other factors also influence behavior), but this idea was already posited by other psychologists (e.g., Walter Michel) decades before Zimbardo. He basically stole an idea, ran a poorly designed study, and wrote a bunch of books on it.

Bravo!

It's not the eyebrows; it's the mustache and little beardlet. And the smile. And the sweater. Looks weakly evil.

In high school, we watched the Discovering Psychology series in AP Psych class. Our teacher convinced most of us that Zimbardo was not a real person but rather a high-quality animatronic "professor." Every tape, we'd look for minute evidence for/against her claim.

TNH @24 "prison systems are full of uncontrolled variables. I don't know where you're getting that "shoddy and unnecessary," unless you're being contrary."

Yes prison systems are full of uncontrolled variables, however uncontrolled variables are not fatal to an experiment or to science generally, so long as you understand and take steps to deal with them. Psychologists and sociologists have studied prisons and the people in them for years both before and after Zimbardo without the need to resort to flashy experiments. This is why i call it unnecessary because people before and sense have gotten better results using science to deal with the uncontrolled variables.

I call it shoddy because so many important scientific principles are ignored in the creation and execution of the experiment. Others have detailed some, but just to name a few, there is no control group for this experiment, that is, nothing with which to compare the results. The test subjects all interact with one another, meaning that each subject cannot be taken as an independent trial. The behavior of one person will effect the group as a whole, so the only thing you can really study with a setup of this type is group dynamics, not individual behavior. Additionally, no steps are taken to separate the subjects from the experiment, this is why i called it role-playing, because the participants are told, in effect "we want to see what happens in prisons so go act like prison guards or prisoners" One participant even said he acted the way he did because he saw it on a movie.

And again I ask, why not just study real prisons? What is the big advantage to faking the whole thing? You say uncontrolled variables but there are tons of uncontrolled variables in this experiment that can never be quantified, at least with real prisons your studies can be repeated easily.

This is all just the tip of the iceberg. As others have said, you can write whole books on why these experiments were non-scientific garbage and that isnt even touching the ethical problems with this sort of thing.

So having answered your questions to the best of my ability, let me ask you this: What do you like about this guy? At least Milgram made the effort to make his experiments scientific, this guy didnt even bother. Do *you* just like his results?

Or perhaps a rapier-wielding Spaniard badguy.

or Señor Montoya, moments after selling a sword to a six-fingered man?

If this were Fark, I'd put him behind a Burger King counter and give him a "Where is your God now?" caption.

without viewing his TED speech or looking at the survey; YES, heroism in the only answer to the banality of evil. Just don't expect any reward beyond suffering, condemnation, etc. We MUST stand up.

don't expect any reward beyond suffering, condemnation, etc. We MUST stand up. Inspiring stuff. You should design recruitment posters: "Be a hero today! Suffer condemnation and victimisation for the rest of your -- possibly brief -- life! Visit your local recruitment office today".

Wow, that was some swift condemnation.

Yes, to be heroic is to seek positive change.

...variables in this experiment that can never be quantified, at least with real prisons your studies can be repeated easily.

Isn't the original study qualitative, not quantitative? It's basically a mini-ethnographical study. Who is more conditioned to act like a prison guard; a college student who signed up for a study on a lark, or someone who completed enforcement training in preparation to become a screw?

The study is so powerful because it suggests how easily any of us can slip into power/powerless roles.

#34 If this study is ethnographical then why not study actual prisons? What is the point of creating a fake culture then studying it holistically?

"The study is so powerful because it suggests how easily any of us can slip into power/powerless roles."

You could make that claim about Milgram, maybe, but a flawed, unscientific study's only use is to act as an example of what not to do.

And what do you mean by "qualitative, not quantitative"? What does that mean from a scientific basis?

To be more clear on my last point, if your going to do an ethnographic study of a culture, and you use a representation of that culture, rather then the real thing, then your study is only as good as the representation is accurate, no more. Its a bit like studying Hawaiian culture by watching Magnum P.I., you might learn something, but your way better off just going to Hawaii and learning from the people there.

The study has to do with people slipping into these roles in a general sense. It isn't a study of prison culture! Sheesh.
The prisons commission routinely does "prison studies" if you want statistics or specific population studies.

If you want to simply observe people's propensity to take on power roles without questioning them, you can look at unique studies like the Stanford experiment. Have you looked at it's data? Zimbardo may have done a quantitative analysis, I don't recall. Qualitative studies are impressions taken "in the field", whereas quantitative data is has more to do with statistics.
The Stanford experiment functioned ethnographically in that it targeted a small group assembled for the purposes of the study. Any small group study may be considered ethnographic.
Do you see the difference in a study meant to draw out latent behaviors and one that observes the effects of existing conditions?

BBAte My Name: Don't get shirty; you don't do it well. I asked for specifics because it's not very interesting to listen to a bunch of generic grousing about how some guy's work allegedly sucks.

Amayain:

Zimbardo is known for taking a few, relatively narrow studies and making giant bold claims about them.

To be fair, what stuck with me most about the Stanford Prison Experiment was the outrageousness of it; the design, the observed behavior-all of it. It of course doesn't come close to the inhumane cases cited by the IRB human subjects research guidelines though.

I've always been amazed that people are willing to accept the Stanford Prison Experiment. It always comes out of the woodwork when people want to "prove" how awful humans can be, especially in a coercive/corrosive environment, like "the current political one". And it's always "the current political one" that's being proved by the excrable SPE.

It isn't as if all of us don't know that some humans will behave like monsters if given the chance. Milgram's experiment was an excellent example of how a lot of us will do so even if not normally inclined, but the Stanford Prison Experiment is a bad joke and Zimbardo has dined off this joke for nearly 40 years.

It was 1971 and involved college students at the height of the under thirty crowd's anti-authoritarianism. There was no double blind here. These kids knew, but obviously didn't acknowledge that they knew, what they wanted to prove. They also knew that they would play their roles, go "crazy" in the allotted time and no harm, no foul, would then go on with the rest of their lives. It was a silly game. Sillier, in fact, because there were/are plenty of real world examples of people being put into horrific circumstances and engaging in atrocious behavior, and, by the way, suffering from the experience for the rest of their lives. You want an example of people who have done the unthinkable because of circumstance; talk to any soldier who had to engage in hand-to-hand combat.

The kids in the SPE had some free time and couldn't wait to prove how the "man" will twist you. They would have only done the "atrocities" for two reasons; if they had actual pressure to behave in that manner for real reasons, i.e., real economic consequences in their lives (like losing their source of livelihood) or questions of commitment to honor (like those poor bastards who took all the Abu Ghraib blame while the brass wore halos and said, "Bad apples, don't you know") OR if they wanted to play act to prove a point. Given the era, the age of the participants, and that they were college students in that era, it's seems pretty obvious the SPE was a game. A game that, for some reason, genuinely aggrieved people want to trot out as proof.

Somebody please, chop down the pedestal that Zimbardo is standing on.

Seamus,
You can't design an experiment using real atrocity-it has to be presented as a game using willing participants! Of course you can always take your pick of first hand accounts.
I am interested in your opinions. I assume the experiment has plenty of detractors. Also, I'm not a defender of Zimbardo or the Stanford experiment. Can you back up your claims? Has the thing been refuted or are you just making reasonable assumptions that challenge its validity?
I haven't noticed any comparisons to the current political situation,for the record. I would more likely compare the US administration to the study that led test subjects to believe they could deliver near-lethal shocks to other test takers. Or was that from the same experiment?

Anthony,

What I'm saying is that this never rose to the level of experiment. It was a game, simply a game, nothing more.

Re my claims: the same claims made by most of the SPE's detractors. We got Google here folks! (that last is said in fun, don't get huffy)

As for the comparisons: After the Abu Ghraib and Gitmo scandals were exposed, the SPE was trotted out like clockwork. I'm old enough to remember a couple of cycles where the SPE is claimed as proof of our corrosive systems, it gets a load of attention, then dies out as it's realized that it wasn't scientifically controlled, was in fact a botch, then finally, nobody talks about it until...

The last study you referred to was Milgram's. Now that one really is chilling.

I guess I don't see the point you're making, Seamus. What invalid conclusions were drawn from the SPE? The antithesis would be "No, sometimes it actually does turn out to be impossible to find good help when you want to do something heinous." Clearly that's not the case.

Zimbardo and Milgram were both concerned with understanding how the Holocaust happened. They got their answer: about three-fourths of people will do anything you say if you're carrying a clipboard and wearing a uniform.

You may not like the conclusion, but it's valid enough. (And yes, the SPE was a horribly-designed experiment. Milgram's wasn't, though.)

Thanks, Seamus.

bugs: heros are real. That is why there is no cake.

no cake? waaah!

#43 The problem isnt invalid conclusions being drawn, its that no conclusions can be drawn from a bad experiment. Garbage in garbage out.

Milgram's work wasent perfect, but he deserves real credit for his work. The ethics of it are unclear, but at least his work is scientific and he and others followed up on the initial findings. For example, when Milgram ran the experiment again under the guise of a private company rather than Yale, the completion rate went down quite a bit, less people were willing to "kill". The variations are interesting and he takes his science seriously. Zimbardo is a cheap imitation, he added nothing to the body of science.

I should amend my previous comments: "with the Standford prison experiment" I dont know that much about Zimbardo other than the SPE, ive never read his book.

Curious thought - how will spreading the survey via the web (especially blogs) affect selection bias? Random sampling this is not.

"Put a good person into an evil situation, and that person will become evil". Therefore the Abu Ghraib guards should be forgiven.

But there is no reason to suppose that Zimbardo's guards were not evil to begin with. Perhaps they were simply evil people put in a neutral environment, with the opportunity to act evil without repercussion. The Abu Ghraib guards should have been punished more severely, perhaps to being tortured by their former prisoners.

Zimbardo may not have purposely selected evil guards, but even if they were selected at random, and no more evil than the average person, we should not assume that the average person is good and not evil.

Perhaps they are only restrained from acting evil, by the threat of punishment by the legal system, shame of any evil acts being exposed to their friends and families, fear of retribution from the victim, worry about punishment from God/karma, etc.

The lesson I learn from the SPE is to use this to restraint evil people from acting evil. We can make them act good. Guards (and anyone else in positions of authority, police, etc) who abuse their authority should be severely punished. More severely than ordinary persons would be, because they make their colleagues job harder, and they undermine the "authority".

Guards should not be anonymous. They should not wear small name tags that's easily obscured/covered. Their uniforms should have large painted numbers, both in front and on the back. Think sports jerseys. This makes them easily identifiable from a distance, and in CCTV recordings.

Every inch inside prisons should be covered by CCTV, recorded and archived, and available live on the Internet. If a guard abuse a prisoner, it will be seen by his neighbours and children, and more importantly, by the victims friend and family.

There is another important lesson from the SPE. The most effective way to break resistance is not to punish the ringleader, but to punish his cell-mates. They then pressure him to conform, and he broke in less than 2 days. We should apply this lesson on the guards as well. Guards who don't actually do anything evil themselves, but do nothing, and allow they evil colleagues a free hand should be punished as well.

put a good person in a bad situation and that good person will fix it or break it - or be broken. I've done it, so can you.

By the way, Milgram's experiment was replicated last year.

...

I'm not sure depravity is the point. Personally, I think the one thing the Stanford Prison Experiment clearly demonstrated is a phenomenon I've seen in other contexts: When you take participants who have little or no experience with role-playing games, and put them into an extended, open-ended, improvisational RPG, things will go further and get weirder than you expect, and it's possible that some of your participants will get bent way out of shape.

Milgram's more careful and controlled experiments really do speak to the willingness of individuals to follow orders given them by authority figures, even if those orders are contrary to their own values and convictions. I think Zimbardo's much sloppier experiment doesn't speak to our readiness to adopt authoritarian roles so much as it does our susceptibility to roleplaying in general. If Zimbardo had come up with other comparably effective scenarios, could he have gotten equally striking results but very different behaviors?

For instance, you could compare the sudden shifts in individual behavior in the SPE with the Second Great Awakening, and the series of great revivals (circa 1799-1803) that blew up like a string of thunderstorms in frontier communities like Cane Ridge, Kentucky, and Turtle Creek, Ohio. When you read contemporary accounts, it's clear that the itinerant preachers who began it were blindsided. They had no more idea what kind of explosion they were setting off than the organizers of the Woodstock Festival did. They were gobsmacked by the profundity and weirdness of their hearers' conversion experiences. They could tell that what was happening was social and contextual, but otherwise it might as well have been magic. The tone of their reactions teeter between "This is God's work, and it is astounding," and "This is out of control."

It passed. The revivals spread, multiplied, and gradually dissipated, leaving all kinds of historical and spiritual oddments in their wake. But while they lasted, they were undeniably real. So were the behaviors they generated. And yet, we don't talk much about a natural propensity for religious enthusiasm as a component of human character.

Maybe we should likewise dismiss Zimbardo's hypothesized tendency to fall into authoritarian roles. Or maybe we should make a note that those are both roles to which we're susceptible. Or maybe it's the roleplaying that does it, and we've only scratched the surface of human folly, in which case there could be entire unexplored ranges of weird behavior just waiting to ambush us. If so, the only reason those aberrations haven't manifested yet is that conditions haven't been right. It gives us something to look forward to.

Wow. Nice work Teresa.
Your musings make me want to search for positive social booms of group behavior like those Vienna produced in the time of Freud.
As for role playing, I know it can be an interesting and creative educational device.

“Oh, come to the mourners' bench! come, black with sin! (amen!) come, sick and sore! (amen!) come, lame and halt and blind! (amen!) come, pore and needy, sunk in shame! (a-a-men!) come, all that's worn and soiled and suffering!— come with a broken spirit! come with a contrite heart! come in your rags and sin and dirt! the waters that cleanse is free, the door of heaven stands open—oh, enter in and be at rest!” (a-a-men! glory, glory hallelujah!)

And so on. You couldn't make out what the preacher said any more, on account of the shouting and crying. Folks got up everywheres in the crowd, and worked their way just by main strength to the mourners' bench, with the tears running down their faces; and when all the mourners had got up there to the front benches in a crowd, they sung and shouted and flung themselves down on the straw, just crazy and wild.

Well, the first I knowed the king got a-going, and you could hear him over everybody; and next he went a-charging up on to the platform, and the preacher he begged him to speak to the people, and he done it. He told them he was a pirate—been a pirate for thirty years out in the Indian Ocean—and his crew was thinned out considerable last spring in a fight, and he was home now to take out some fresh men, and thanks to goodness he'd been robbed last night and put ashore off of a steamboat without a cent, and he was glad of it; it was the blessedest thing that ever happened to him, because he was a changed man now, and happy for the first time in his life; and, poor as he was, he was going to start right off and work his way back to the Indian Ocean, and put in the rest of his life trying to turn the pirates into the true path; for he could do it better than anybody else, being acquainted with all pirate crews in that ocean; and though it would take him a long time to get there without money, he would get there anyway, and every time he convinced a pirate he would say to him, “Don't you thank me, don't you give me no credit; it all belongs to them dear people in Pokeville camp-meeting, natural brothers and benefactors of the race, and that dear preacher there, the truest friend a pirate ever had!”

And then he busted into tears, and so did everybody. Then somebody sings out, “Take up a collection for him, take up a collection!” Well, a half a dozen made a jump to do it, but somebody sings out, “Let him pass the hat around!” Then everybody said it, the preacher too.

Mighty fine, mighty fine.

"I preach there are all kinds of truth, your truth and somebody else's. But behind all of them there is only one truth and that is that there's no truth."

O, Hazel Motes.

People adapt their behavior to the roles they're in. The prisoners did as well as the guards. Much of what we attribute to character is the structure of a person's role. Like when we complain about power-mad DMV clerks, when in fact DMV clerks are about as powerless as an employee can be.

Of course real character also affects how people behave in their roles.

I think it's important to look at roles and characters as different things: how much were SPE participants playing a character, playing a role, or being themselves?

The distinction is important, because there is a difference between "I'm working as a prison guard, " and "I'm playing that sadistic bastard guard from Prison Break". One is a role and one is a character.

When you adopt the role of prison guard, you turn your mind to the task of keeping the prisoners in line, and you start assessing their behavior in terms of how it affects your performance.

They start assessing your behavior in terms of how if affects their coping with their powerlessness.

And humans tend to think of other individuals in terms of motivation and character, not roles. So you as the guard start thinking about prisoner's bad attitudes, failure to respect your authority, and potential for trouble. The prisoner guy starts to think about you in terms of your obsession with power and your sadism. And you both react to each other accordingly.

The structure of the role can explain a lot of behavior without assuming any participant is playing a character - someone they saw in a movie or on TV. Likewise, the role can explain a lot of behavior without assuming any participant is in fact a sadist. The behaviors are emergent.

At the same time, some of the participants are doubtless using some character they saw on TV to guide their actions. It is human nature to emulate exemplars.

And also at the same time, there's a good chance one or more of the participants did in fact have some psychological tendency towards cruelty and a hunger for power over others.

This is why the social sciences are harder than the hard sciences. How would you control for those variables?

And while the SPE may have been about authoritarian roles, the fact that roles affect behavior and perception is not limited to authoritarian power structures.

Oh, and Zimbardo wasn't an animatronic puppet when I met him years ago. Or at least the person playing Zimbardo at the time wasn't. Couldn't say now. Technology's come such a long way.