PSYCH291 Lecture Notes - Dave Eshelman, Alex Blum, Philip Zimbardo
Document Summary
Spe is presented in intro to psych classes as an example of the power of situation. Not published in a peer reviewed journal. Zimbardo motivated to reform the prison system as he was on a committee that advocated for this. Construct validity: not clear what the operational variables were, informal (diary) observations of participants" behaviour. External validity: a homogenous sample: 22 participants (21 caucasian), who all responded to participate in a study about prison life for . Went through a test battery to weed out psychological problems. All very similar in terms of demographic. The guards given no training or instruction on how to be guards. Alex blum (successful army man and good student) was radicalized in the rangers (part of the army) and committed an armed robbery. Believed it was part of a training exercise(?) Philip zimbardo called in as an expert witness. Ben blum motivated to look into zimbardo due to his testimony in his brothers trial.
