Why wasn't Stanford sued into oblivion for this? - The Stanford Prison Experiment (2015) Discussion

[–] SteverB 9 years ago

They all signed contracts that, I'm sure, absolved Stanford and Zimbardo of any wrongdoing in the context of the experiment. That, and it was 1971, when people weren't as litigious as they are these days.

reply

[–] kadajawi 9 years ago

But Zimbardo kind of ignored the contracts in the first place, didn't he? He should have aborted the experiment way earlier, as clearly the prisoners wanted it to end. And there must have been something like that in the contract. Also, the prisoners were actually physically abused and hit, and the students kept saying that according to the contract that wasn't allowed. I don't think that after that the contract would have provided Zimbardo much protection.

reply

[–] bing-57 9 years ago

> That, and it was 1971, when people weren't as litigious as they are these days.

However, there is no statute of limitations on this kind of thing, so, as society has become more litigious, the lawsuits should have started flowing. Stanford would have been smart to pay off these people early on.

--
What Would Jesus Do For A Klondike Bar (WWJDFAKB)?

reply

[–] irepbtown-816-715699 9 years ago

If I am not mistaken, if you commit a crime in say, 1971 and you are taken to court in 2016 the laws involved are those from 1971 meaning any changes to the law after that will not be taken into account.

reply

[–] bing-57 9 years ago

> If I am not mistaken, if you commit a crime in say, 1971 and you are taken to court in 2016 the laws involved are those from 1971 meaning any changes to the law after that will not be taken into account.

I don't think it works that way. We regularly see people sued for millions of 2016 dollars for asbestos and cigarette smoke they were exposed to in 1940. It happens all the time that people are tried with modern standards and given modern sentences for crimes committed decades ago.

Now, what they don't do is rescind sentences for crimes that become legal. Colorado and Washington still have tens of thousands of people serving sentences for marijuana possession even though it is legal now.

--
What Would Jesus Do For A Klondike Bar (WWJDFAKB)?

reply

[–] kmd11 9 years ago

Even if they did break some kind of law, the statute of limitations has likely run out.

reply

[–] bing-57 9 years ago

> Even if they did break some kind of law, the statute of limitations has likely run out.

Every time someone beats the system when the statute of limitations runs out, some angry Congressman write a law to remove the statute. More and more crimes have no statute of limitation.

I mean, look at all those paintings the Nazis stole in WWII. None of the owners of those paintings are alive today and neither are any of the thieves. Yet, the previous owners sue the current owners and win.

Sunken treasure from the 1400s is often claimed by the previous owners when a treasure hunter finds it 600 years later.

The law has a very long reach.

--
What Would Jesus Do For A Klondike Bar (WWJDFAKB)?

reply

[–] tzogas 9 years ago

^this^

**Have an A1 day**

reply

[–] bladesman2 9 years ago

It does work that way, to a large extent, in the UK. Don't really know about the US, but it's worth saying that a large part of why tobacco lawsuits went on for so long is because they intentionally distorted and lied about the evidence of the harm that cigarettes cause. They knew that they were causing all sorts of diseases at the time.

In the past, and this is true of the US, the standards for things like informed consent were much lower than today and I'd guess that the US government, given some of the experiments they were performing, aren't too interested in opening the door for litigation of this kind.

reply

[–] USAFmedicVET 9 years ago

"irepbtown-816-715699 replied Apr 7, 2016
If I am not mistaken, if you commit a crime in say, 1971 and you are taken to court in 2016 the laws involved are those from 1971 meaning any changes to the law after that will not be taken into account."

Yes! Ask Michael Skakel, who served 11 Adult prison years for murder when he was 15 years old. (Out on bail now, awaiting a new trial)
Seems if the laws are restorative, so should the punishment.
_______________________________

"We in it shall be remembered;
We few, we happy few,
We Band of Brothers" ~W.S.

reply

[–] Tarquin_Q_Zanzibar 9 years ago

I think the real reason was summed up in one sentence: "people weren't as litigious as they are these days". And lawyers were legally prohibited from the aggressive litigation-touting advertising they do now.

And perhaps more importantly, contemporary culture encourages a victim mentality and a blame culture where no-one is responsible for their own actions - sometimes to frankly absurd lengths - "It's not my fault I killed my filthy-rich parents, I was traumatised by being sent away to private schools, I am the victim here"... this was largely absent in the sixties, when people not only understood, but were enthused by the words "ask not what your country can do for you - ask what can you do for your country". It seems that pretty much the reverse holds true now.

"You've got lovely eyes Dee-Dee, never noticed them before, are they real?"

reply

[–] hermanomri 8 years ago

I don't think you can legally make a contract that enables a person to imprison another person. Even if such a contract were to be signed,it would not be legally binding,and the "prisoner" would be free to leave. Anything else is kidnapping

reply

[–] MrsGubler 9 years ago

I find it sick and wrong that the people running this experiment weren't held accountable for the emotional damage they caused the subjects. The fact that the lead Dr. continued after the abuse started made me irate. That's someone's child. If someone did that to my son they'd have hell to pay!

reply

[–] Thierminator 9 years ago

Well, while during the actual experiment prisoners experienced signs of mental breakdowns and some even psychosomatic skin conditions, after the experiment they barely showed any signs of emotional damage. Zimbardo organised several meetings with both the prisoners and the guards afterwards and while the prisoners were relieved that it was over, they also were glad they experienced it. They learned a lot about themselves and fellow humans. Also they were probably given contracts beforehand that would give the school and the people running the experiment immunity from following lawsuits.

I do have to admit, that I haven't seen the movie yet so I don't know how true to life it is.

reply

[–] Carols_Murderous_Moppets 9 years ago

In US states such as California, a waiver is not lawful when it is contrary to an express provision of law, its implicit policy, or good morals. Furthermore, one cannot waive responsibility for violation of law, willful injury to a person or property of another, for fraud, or waive their residential tenant rights.

In other words when the students asked for medical treatment and were denied, [Contract:Null & Void ] when they asked to end their participation in the experiment, and Zimbardo denied them that right [Contract: Null & Void.] an injury waiver only protects you from "Accidental harm."

______

"They're not dead, they're just...different."

reply

[–] nns-06276 9 years ago

Seriously? The manipulative guilty party interviewed them himself, and then declared himself innocent of harming them. Sounds legit.

reply

[–] waneagony 9 years ago

I find it sick and wrong that the people running this experiment weren't held accountable for the emotional damage they caused the subjects. The fact that the lead Dr. continued after the abuse started made me irate. That's someone's child. If someone did that to my son they'd have hell to pay!

Agreed. Zimbardo seems to be a real sicko if he was anything like this move portrayed him letting this go as far as it did.

“It has been my philosophy of life that difficulties vanish when faced boldly.”
― Isaac Asimov

reply

[–] Im-not-all-here-myself 9 years ago

We studied this experiment when I was getting my masters in Psycholog. The experiment, although incredibly unethical today, DID actually provide some answers when it came to prison reform in the late 70's - early 80's.
It was also re-studied when the abuses at Abu-Ghirab prison were leaked to find out why trained American soldiers would/could commit such acts against prisoners. It wasn't used to "excuse" the guards, but it did help explain why they behaved the way they did.
It also extended our understanding of how "civilians" can allow themselves to become so controlled by "authority figures", thus solidifying the theory of "Cognitive Dissodence".
Dr Zimbardo admitted later that he DID find himself detached from the situation and just "an observer". Even when "prisoners", who obviously wanted out of the experiment, and just had to say "I want out" didn't do so, he found himself questioning them more harshly than he believes he would have prior to the experiment. After he gave his findings over to the navy and Congress, he changed disciplines and began a long career on prison psychology and reform. Because of his work, child and younger offenders are no longer housed pre-trial with adult inmates AND he pushed hard to increase the age of "juvenile offenders' to age 20.

The experiment still scares people today simply because it proved that a perfectly normal person could suddenly become a sadist with only a small bit of prodding. Also, that those same people could become meek, subdued "victims".

Yes, the experiment was pretty vile, but Dr Zimbardo held numerous interviews with the participants and apparently no-one had any long term effects. So, he wasresponsible in that respect. Plus, society actually learned something from the experiment as well.

Which way you want to go depends entirely upon where you want to get to

reply

[–] dv727 8 years ago

Yeah, I read the post-script at the end of the movie--gratuitous swill. WHEN and how often did "researchers" conduct follow-up interviews? Anyone talk to any of Zimbardo's victims 10, 20, or more years later? While this bag of phlegm is giving TED talks and interviews (for profit, I'm certain), how many of his "subjects" are in therapy, trouble with the law, or worse? If they're not a volume of problems now, it's because of their inner strength, and despite the "Doctor's" actions.

reply

[–] carriekosiak 9 years ago

Maybe they volunteered to be part of the experiment as prisoners. But what legal claim could Stanford have been sued for? It was the college.

reply

[–] 9 years ago

[deleted]

[–] stellastey 9 years ago

I remember reading about this years ago,(i havn't seen the film) but i thought anyone was free to leave anytime they liked.

reply

[–] jmftown9 8 years ago

They were but when ever they attempt to they were coerced into staying or frankly simply not allowed to leave.

reply

[–] Jenny_80 9 years ago

From what I've read it took a little longer in real life for the abuse to ramp up, but it must have been going on by the second day because that is when a few of the "prisoners" started to be released. The movie has dramatized some of what went on for obvious reasons, probably because it's harder to show how a person can break down from psychological effects rather than physically abusive treatment. I read in one place that no physical abuse actually happened during the experiment, but I don't know how legitimate that source is. I agree with the op as well, there should have been some sort of consequences for the actions of the researchers, they took it way too far and knowingly left their test subjects in a dangerous situation. Zimbardo should have lost his license to practice, he wasn't even running a legitimate experiment since he didn't even have a variable to comparing the study to, but instead has received a ton of success off of this "experiment". We may have learned a lot from the experiment, but we also learned a lot from the experiments the Nazis did on their prisoners, it doesn't make it right.

I read an interview with Zimbardo's wife where she claimed that if she didn't know him so well she would have run far from him when she saw the experiment, but she decided to stay with him. It's amazing how love will make a person blind.

reply

[–] FlyingSaucersAreReal 8 years ago

The psychologist who ran the experiment had a pretty strong opinions and that influenced the conclusions he made. He really focused on the more authoritarian guards and the violence and downplayed the fact that many of the guards treated the prisoners decently. His idea was that the subjects would quickly lose their individuality and that the setting and the roles they were playing would be what really effected how they behaved. The truth was the way the guards acted varied quite a bit from individual to individual.

But his conclusions were what caught on with the media and the public, even though the experiment was pretty heavily criticized by people in the psychology field, for a lot of reasons. I don't believe its really taken seriously in psychology textbooks, because it was so flawed.

-Sitting on a cornflake waiting for the van to come

reply

[–] ferreira0665 9 years ago

There was a few reasons. If what is portrayed in the film is true:

1. Contracts were signed.
2. Most of the bad stuff happened when Zimbardo wasn't actually present so what he saw didn't seem so bad. It wasn't until the end after his girlfriend tells him it needs to end that he goes back and sees what he allowed to happen and ends it himself.
3. The experiment wasn't fully thought out. It was a sound idea in theory but no one running it had any idea students on both sides of the fence would become so submissive and sadistic.
4. The scene with doctor/friend telling 1037 how horrible of a person he is and then hating himself for it was a realization. As well as the girlfriend seeing what was going on and telling him to end it and what she had to say.
5. The experiment ended up crossing the line and becoming a simulation which was not the intention of people running it.

Now while these may not all be really good reasons why they weren't sued. They more than likely are the movies.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie as well as making me kinda feel sick inside.

If I got a choice of which side of the fence I'd would be on. I would have probably chose being an inmate over a guard but if I was a guard, I would have said something sooner to the John Wayne guard. I would have not submitted to his lead as the other guards seemed to as well as the inmates.

reply

[–] FilmFigment 9 years ago

exactly what I was thinking while watching this!

reply

[–] thebricks 9 years ago

This was all a performance. No one would have taken this seriously in real life. Give me a break.

reply

[–] katemiller-18083 9 years ago

Some people have made some really good points on this thread as to why it isn't something that Stanford could be held liable for. One the more important points is that ethically speaking, the psychology/psychiatry field wasn't held to the same ethical standards as it is in 2016. In order to conduct an experiment now, there are all of these considerations we have to make before we can even get to the point of seeking approval from a school/research board. This experiment was one of the catalysts for a lot of those ethical considerations we have now.

Secondly, the experiment itself is just one in a long litany of (sometimes questionable) explorations of the human psyche and the malleability of human behaviour. Think about the study and treatment of female hysteria or schizophrenia. Early research into so many mental health conditions would now be considered unethical, but at the time was accepted and led to breakthroughs in the study of human behaviour.

In saying all of this, I'm not saying that I agree with the experiment however you can't criticise researchers who were acting within the legal and ethical parameters of the time, when you're coming at it from a point 30+ years into the future.

reply

[–] hermanomri 8 years ago

My thoughts exactly.
I had just recently watched the movie about The Stanford prison experiment, also dubbed "The Stanford prison experiment", and was kind of shocked to learn Zimbardo himself wasn't punished in any way. I mean, according to the movie anyway, he has commited numerous illegal ( not to mention morally ambigous and perhaps even evil) acts. He has violated his contracts with his sublects, has wrongully denied them their freedom even when they explicitly asked to leave. Isnt that kidnapping?? He had promised no physical harm would come to his subjects (in writing as part of the contract) but then condones and even encourages violence ,wasnt he in complete violation of his contracts? I dont know much about American law but don't americans have something called the good samaritan law"?? It's like no one took any legal actions against him because he is clever... Undoubtedly he is clever but shouldnwt he be held responsible for his actions? is everyone perhaps forgiving him because of his academic authority? Was'nt this one of the main warnings of his own experiment?
And what about the guards? Surly they are guilty of assault and sexual abuse at the least

reply