“I was told a long time ago that the situation doesn’t make the man – it reveals him. The following  is an old experiment that everyone should have a look at….”

The Stanford Prison Experiment, Milgram Experiment

How Easily Can You Become a Victim or a Perpetrator?

“If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds,
and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

From The People At The Insight Course

It’s very easy to blame others for all of our problems. It’s easy to accuse the evil terrorists or the corrupt rulers of our world for creating all the problems we have to deal with both individually and collectively. Yet how would you react if put in stressful conditions with intense social and authoritative pressure to behave in ways that go against your own ethics and morals?

Both the Milgram electric shock experiment and the Stanford prison experiment were designed to explore this probing question. Dr. Stanley Milgram designed an experiment where normal individuals were asked by a researcher to give increasingly intense electric shocks to a subject each time they gave the wrong answer to a question. The highest level of shock had the potential of killing the subject. How far would volunteers go when told by a researcher that they should administer these intense shocks? Watch The Milgram Experiment

If you are interested in a longer, more in-depth documentary on a 2009 re-creation of this landmark human behavior study, See this BBC production is 20-minutes in length.

As a second example, Dr. Philip Zimbardo designed the Stanford prison experiment to explore what would happen to normal college students when arbitrarily assigned to roles of prisoner and guard in a real life prison simulation done in the basement of Stanford University’s psychology department. The students were paid to take on these roles for two weeks as a study of human behavior. How much would they actually conform to their assigned roles of prisoners and guards? Watch the eye-opening, 30-minute BBC documentary on the Stanford Prison Experiment

Both Dr. Zimbardo and Dr. Milgram were quite surprised and disturbed by the results of their experiments. These landmark studies have raised many questions for both researchers and all who have learned of these human experiments.

After seeing how easily most people can be influenced by authority to commit acts very much against their ethics, an important question arises. What would you have done if you were instructed by a researcher to give possibly lethal electric shocks to the subject of a study?

Though these two landmark experiments present some disturbing conclusions about the human condition, remember that the opposite of these conclusions is equally true. When put in caring, supportive environments, the vast majority of people will flourish and have a wonderful, positive impact on people and the world around them. Two of the most amazing videos ever produced demonstrate this in a way that is guaranteed to inspire.

The first 15-minute video presents Challenge Day, an incredibly transforming program in which teens come to understand how they hurt each other and, more importantly, how they can come together to help each other make a difference. Don’t miss this Emmy-awarding winning program Challenge Day.

The second video (also 15 minutes) shows how one man, faced with challenges far greater than most of us will ever experience, is able to be a powerfully creative force in our world – What Matters, Mitchell

All these videos show not that humans are inherently bad or evil, nor that we are inherently good. They show that when we are not clear in our own priorities and intentions, and when we give too much power to authority, we can be manipulated and controlled in ways that do not serve anyone. They also show that when we understand ourselves and make a choice to be aware of our weaknesses, yet focus on building our strengths, we can be a positive force in building a better world for all of us. Together, I have no doubt that we can and will build a brighter future. Thanks for caring.