“The New Stanford Prison Experiment” ends on a far more hopeful note than Stanford psychology professor Philip Zimbardo’s original 1971 trial.
\n\nThe first iteration of the Stanford prison experiment took 24 white male college students (save one Asian American) and paid them $15 a day to participate in a two-week simulated prison environment in order to study the effects of incarceration. Students were randomly assigned to the roles of guards or inmates, with the guards pressured to maintain order by any means necessary. Participants fell into their roles a little too well and, after a prisoner rebellion, increasingly cruel forms of punishment from the guards and a number of students suffering mental breakdowns, the experiment was ended on the sixth day. It’s widely considered one of the most notorious, ethically compromised psychological studies in history.
\n\nAnd so, on Oct. 21, Netflix debuted “The New Stanford Prison Experiment,” a six-episode reality-TV version from executive producers Jane Lipsitz and Dan Cutforth (“Top Chef”) that saw thirty entrants of various racial, geographical and economic backgrounds — including three women — partake in a two-week simulated prison environment, only this time in the decommissioned cell block of an actual working prison. Eight of them…
Original source: https://variety.com/v/tv/