Comparison of the “A Study of Prisoners and Guards in a Simulated Prison” and “Cognitive Consequences of Forced Compliance”

Psychology experiments can yield important results in terms of understanding human behavior and action in the face of different social institutions and situations. One particularly significant thread of inquiry is examining how people react when they are forced to behave in certain ways. “A Study of Prisoners and Guards in a Simulated Prison” (Zimbardo, 1973), also known as the Stanford Prison Experiment and “Cognitive Consequences of Forced Compliance” (Festinger & Carlsmith, 1959) both examine this idea of social institutions and situations (such as incarceration) in which forced behavior occurs; however, where Festinger’s and Carlsmith’s work is considered a classic psychological experiment that furthered understanding in the field, the Stanford Prison Experiment is infamous.

“A Study of Prisoners and Guards in a Simulated Prison” was led by Dr. Philip Zimbardo and was commissioned by branches of the United States’ military to examine the dynamics of the relationship between prisoners and guards, specifically the causes of conflict (Zimbardo, 1973, p. 3). In the experiment, Zimbardo constructed a mock prison and randomly assigned subjects the role of either prisoner or guard (p. 5). The prisoners were forced to remain in their cells, while the guards worked shifts inside the prison. The purpose of the study was to examine the psychological effects that being a prisoner, or a guard had on people (p. 4). The study was intended to last two weeks but was ended prematurely after six days because of a number of issues that had come up in the study. For example, many of the prisoners had to be released early because they were traumatized by the effects that being a prisoner had on them, including “extreme emotional depression, crying, rage and acute anxiety” as well as one person developing a rash on his body from stress (p. 10). The guards were also affected, with many “distressed by the decision to stop the experiment” because they “now enjoyed the extreme control and power which they exercised and were reluctant to give it up” (p. 10). Though Zimbardo drew some interesting conclusions about the pathology of power, the experiment itself was unethical because of the treatment the test subjects endured and a lack of intervention by Zimbardo or other researchers to address the significant mental problems that the test subjects were facing as a result of an experiment that was not properly safeguarded.

In contrast to this was the experiment by Festinger and Carlsmith in 1959 to study the idea of forced compliance. In the experiment, also at Stanford, a group of test subjects were separated into groups and asked to perform a monotonous, unenjoyable task (Festinger & Carlsmith, 1959, p. 204). The task was to move spools on and off of trays or to turn a peg in a specific direction (pp. 204–205). In some cases, participants were paid either a dollar or twenty dollars, and in some cases the participants were either prepped for the experiment or started the experiment with no expectations (pp. 204–207). The researchers found that people would change their opinion of an unenjoyable task in order to convince themselves that what they were doing was enjoyable (p. 207). This experiment shows proof for cognitive dissonance, which the authors described as “If a person is induced to do or say something which is contrary to his private opinion, there will be a tendency for him to change his opinion so as to bring it into correspondence with what he has done or said” (p. 209).

The Festinger and Carlsmith experiment results can be applied to situations such as being a prison guard in an abusive prison system, but it does not subject the participants to anything more psychologically traumatic than severe boredom, and only for a short time. The experiment proved that conditions from social situations that were potentially problematic for people could be replicated without replicating the awful or potentially dangerous conditions that Zimbardo failed to recognize.

References

Festinger, L., & Carlsmith, J. (1959). Cognitive consequences of forced compliance. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 58, 203–210.

Zimbardo, P. (1971). A study of prisoners and guards in a simulated prison. Naval Research Reviews. Retrieved March 6, 2014 from http://www.zimbardo.com/