[Link] Can We Reverse The Stanford Prison Experiment?

From Dr. Zimbardo in his recent IAMA on Reddit:

Mawkish asks:

If you could conduct any human [sic]bahaviour experiment, without risk to those participating, what would it be? What is your hypothesis for how it would turn out?

Zimbardo:

The answer to this provocative question is given in the introduction to chp 16 in my Lucifer Effect book (2007) where I invited anyone to perform a Reverse Milgram experiment. Milgram was able to demonstrate the relative ease with which ordinary people, 1000 of them, could be systematically led to administer increasingly dangerous levels of shock to an innocent victim by means of gradually raising the shock level with each trial by only 15 volts, until by the end of 30 shocks the voltage was raised to a near lethal 450 volts. At least 2 of every 3 participants went all the way down that slippery slope.

Now can we demonstrate the opposite, that ordinary people can be gradually led to engage in increasingly "good" socially redeeming deeds up to a point of engaging in extremely altruistic, heroic actions, which initially they assert they would never be willing to do?

It would have to be well crafted with early assessments of the prosocial value of each target action on the way up the slippery slope of goodness. It might have to be individually tailored to the values and interests of the target person, thus for some giving one's time is precious, for others it would be money, or working in undesirable conditions, or with an unattractive population of people, etc.

It would be sad to conclude that it is easier to get ordinary people to do evil, than to do heroic actions, so I personally welcome someone to systematically take up my challenge, and I will serve as free consultant.

If you are in experimental psychology, taking him up on this promise sounds like a good way to make your career.

(And perhaps do some good along the way.)

"What are the important problems in your field? Why aren't you working on them?"

It bothers me that much of the focus on the "high ratios of positive to negative feedback lead to improved performance" hypothesis doesn't seem to even mention, much less rule out, the much more obvious "improved performance leads to higher ratios of positive to negative feedback" explanation for correlations between the two. It seems like it would be quite easy to go overboard if that first interpretation were believed to be more widely true than it actually is...

Have each person acknowledge someone else's achievement in a concrete, sincere way. Done right, this very small question can begin to shift the conversation.

Take two minutes every day to try to catch someone doing the right thing. It is the fastest and most positive way for the people around you to learn when they are getting it right.

The "sincere" part of this is incredibly important. If you don't actually mean it, or if you are of the opinion (even subconsciously) that people shouldn't be praised for the thing you're praising them for, it will come across, and with greater impact than the words themselves. Likewise, if you are surprised that a person has done something positive, this also comes across.

This may be the reason why higher Losada ratios become counterproductive -- when everybody feels the need to be positive, the net sincerity goes way down, and people might end up experiencing more implied negative messages, like "Hey, you did that... (finally)" or "Wow, great job on (thing I think is a stupid waste of time)".

It is quite easily possible to use what is overtly praise in ways that actually lower people's self-esteem, and it probably becomes attractive in an environment where positive expression is required and/or overt negative expression is censored.

1. Create a virtual community board where employees, partners and even customers can share what they are grateful for daily. Sounds idealistic?

Sounds like a nightmare. Imagine being The Employee Who Didn't Say Something Positive Yesterday!.

(Disclaimer: I was primed by reading http://kotaku.com/5484581/japan-its-not-funny-anymore right before this.)

Wow. I'm going to change how I do some things...

I had a recent flash of inspiration about the Stanford Prison Experiment. Would it be reasonable to generally consider the exercise of power over others as somehow toxic?

There are many, many examples through history of pathological behavior resulting from the exercise of power absent feedback mechanisms to safeguard the desires and wellbeing of the ruled. To define behavior resulting in the loss of human dignity and human life as pathological seems reasonable to me.

It can be shown that feedback loops in the brain can malfunction given stimuli they weren't designed to handle, leading to addictive behavior and overstimulation of these mechanisms to such an extent that this results in measurable changes in brain structure. I wonder if the exercise of power in contexts far removed from those in village or family groups also results in such changes in the brain? There's certainly a great deal of anecdotal evidence indicating stress involved in the exercise of power.

Perhaps exposure of individuals to the exercise of power should be limited, in the way modern armies try to limit an individual's exposure to combat stress? Also note that modern armies take steps to mitigate combat stress soldiers are exposed to. In the same way, perhaps there should be a study of the toxic effects of the exercise of power, and organizations which must expose individuals to such stressors should take steps to mitigate the toxic effects of power.

Thanks for sharing this!