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Philip Zimbardo’s 1971 ‘prison’ experiment brought more condemnation about the types of research being undertaken with human participants. In attempting to demonstrate that authority figures did not even need to be present to exert influence and that individuals live according to the roles they think society expects of them, Zimbardo recruited a number of college students to replicate prison life in a two-week experiment. The students were divided into one of two conditions – ‘prisoners’ and ‘guard’ – and were then placed into a simulated prison in the basement of the Stanford University psychology building. Prisoners were ‘picked up’ by official policemen, before being transported to the makeshift prison. Their personal effects were confiscated, they were given prison clothes, and referred to by their prisoner identification numbers. The guards were informed that they were responsible for the running of the jail and were told to do whatever they thought necessary to maintain order. From the outset, guards began to treat the prisoners in cruel manner, stripping them naked for misbehaviour, requiring the cleaning out of toilets with bare hands, spraying them with fire extinguishers, even simulating acts of sodomy. Although only some of the guards performed so cruelly, the rest of the guards merely turned a blind eye. Furthermore, guards became more violent when they thought they were not being supervised by Zimbardo, who acted as prison warden, although they were in fact being recorded by video camera. Eventually, Zimbardo had to halt the two-week experiment after six days. It may be unethical but it certainly does predict real human behaviour.