The most disturbing human experiments that could never happen today

There have been a number of famous psychology experiments that are considered controversial, unethical, inhumane, and even downright cruel. In the zeal to learn as much as possible about the human thought process and behavior, many early psychologists went too far with their experimentation. Thanks to strict ethical codes and institutional review boards, most of these experiments could never be performed today.

The Stanford Prison Experiment

Psychologist Philip Zimbardo had an interest in how situational variables contribute to social behavior. In his famous controversial experiment, he set up a mock prison in the basement of the psychology department at Stanford University. Zimbardo and his team picked a group of 24 male college students who were considered physically and psychologically healthy. Participants were then randomly assigned to be either prisoners or guards with Zimbardo himself serving as the prison warden.

The experimenters went to great lengths to create a realistic experience for the prisoners, including fake arrests at the participants’ homes, prison uniforms, and realistic prison environment. The prisoners were put into a situation purposely meant to cause disorientation, degradation, and depersonalization. The guards were given vague instructions that they should never be violent with the prisoners, but needed to stay in control. Though at first, the students were unsure of how to carry out their roles, eventually they had no problem. While the first day passed without significant incidents, the prisoners rebelled on the second day by barricading themselves in their cells and ignoring the guards. This brought a severe response from the guards and things only went downhill from there.

Guards implemented a privilege system meant to break solidarity between prisoners and create distrust between them. The guards became paranoid about the prisoners, believing they were out to get them. This caused the privilege system to be controlled in every aspect, even in the prisoners’ bodily functions. Prisoners began to experience emotional disturbances, extreme stress, depression, and learned helplessness. During this time, prisoners were visited by a prison chaplain. They identified themselves as numbers rather than their names, and when asked how they planned to leave the prison, prisoners were confused. They were completely assimilated into their roles.

The experiment was originally supposed to last for two weeks, but it was halted after just six days when a graduate student (and Zimbardo's future wife) Christina Maslach visited the prison and convinced Zimbardo that the experiment must stop at once since things are going out of control.

The Milgram Experiment

Social psychologist Stanley Milgram, who went to high school with the above-mentioned Philip Zimbardo, conducted a series of experiments to explore the nature of obedience. Milgram's premise was that people would often go to great lengths to obey an authority figure, even if it means being immoral and causing severe pain or deadly danger to other people.

In his notorious study, Milgram set up an experiment with “teachers” who were the actual participants, and a “learner”, who was an actor. The participants were told that the study was about memory and learning and got separated into adjacent rooms so that they could only hear each other.

The teachers were instructed to ask questions and press a button to shock the learner each time he would provide an incorrect answer. The voltage levels started out at 30 volts and increased in 15-volt increments up to a maximum of 450 volts. The switches were also labeled with phrases including "slight shock", "medium shock", and "danger: severe shock". The maximum shock level was simply labeled with an ominous "XXX".

In reality, no one was being shocked. A tape recorder with pre-recorded screams was hooked up to play each time the teacher administered a shock. When the shocks got to a higher voltage, the actor would start banging on the wall and begging the teacher to stop. Eventually, all screams and banging would stop and silence would ensue. This was the point when many of the "teachers" exhibited extreme distress and asked to stop the experiment. Whenever the subject indicated his desire to halt the experiment, he was told by the experimenter "Please continue", "The experiment requires that you continue", "It is absolutely essential that you continue", and "You have no other choice, you must go on". If after all four orders the teacher still wished to stop the experiment, it would be ended. Only 14 out of 40 teachers halted the experiment before administering a 450-volt shock and no teacher firmly refused to stop the shocks before 300 volts. Had the shocks really existed and been at the voltage they were labeled, the majority would have actually killed the learner in the next room.

You can probably see why Milgram's experiment is considered so controversial. Not only did it reveal stunning information about the lengths that people are willing to go in order to obey, it also caused considerable distress for the participants involved.

The Little Albert Experiment

John Watson, father of behaviorism, was a psychologist who was apt to using orphans in his experiments. Watson wanted to test the idea of whether fear was innate or a conditioned response.

Little Albert, the nickname given to the nine months old infant that Watson chose from a hospital, was exposed to a white laboratory rat and was allowed to play with it. At this point, the child showed no fear of the rat and loved animals and fluffy toys.

After some time, Watson began to make a loud sound behind Albert’s back by striking a suspended steel bar with a hammer when the baby touched the rat. On these occasions, Little Albert cried and showed fear as he heard the noise. After this was done several times, Albert became very distressed whenever the rat was displayed. Albert had associated the white rat with the loud noise and was producing the fearful or emotional response of crying.

As the experiment went on, Little Albert started to generalize his fear response to any animal, white objects, and fluffy objects. To make things even worse, Little Albert was not desensitized to his fear since the boy and his mother moved away before Watson could do so.

Please let me know:

• How do you feel about these experiments?
• Do you think that the end justifies the means?

If you liked this post, feel free to also check out my recent article: Can certain video games be considered a form of art?

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