STANFORD COUNTY PRISON

Required Discussion Board assignment.

Socialism is the way humans relate to each other. Humans learn the norms, behavior, values and social skills that they apply in their day to day life. Living organisms learned some of these traits of interaction from human beings as they lived together with human beings.

Social classes were important to people as through them they interacted and people who shared similar characteristics in the society merged together.

These groups enabled one to develop their identity and self, establishment of status relationships; they were sources of motivation and helped in accepting and embracing the values and norms of their society. Social groups are known to give some sense of psychological satisfaction needed to survive and do what one does for a better living. (French, & Gendreau, 2006).

Competition in the United States in terms of social class was faced with lots of definitions and they came up with the poor, middle class and the rich. The class was distinguished by certain factors such as level of education, income and wealth. The poor were uneducated and were unemployed; middle class had acquired college education while the rich (high) class had the best education. This created inequity among the people. (Gray, & Go´mez-Barris, 2010).

Philip Zimbadro set up an experiment in 1971(Stanford prison experiment) with the aim of checking on influences of a prison guard. He further investigated situational factors that influence human behavior. The difference in power between the guard the prison in a prison setting influenced brutality in the guard. This showed wrong elevation of the human values and behavior. From a reality television, it implied that human with tyrannical ways can live together yet they have different backgrounds (classes). (French, & Gendreau, 2006).

The aim of the experiment was for illustration of ‘cognitive dissonance theory and power of authority' whose results supported behavioral attributed to a situation other than disposition attribute. The guards grew more aggressive. Once the prisoners and the guards interacted, the situation was terrible. Some prisoners experienced anxiety and cried. The experiment showed human behavior that is controlled by powerful roles. This was due to the position of power awarded to the prison guards. The prisoners became depressed as they did not have control. (Heiner, 2010).