Experiment on Prisoner and Prison Guard Psychology Movie Review

Experiment on Prisoner and Prison Guard Psychology - Movie Review Example The two works illustrate that the negative quality of the surrounding environment has a big role to play in creating violent people. There are similarities between the Experiment movie and the actual experiment that Zimbardo conducted. First, both consist of volunteers that take part in a psychological study, who act as guards and prisoners. The Experiment movie and the actual experiment involve making prison life as real as possible. In the actual exercise, the police arrested prisoners without a warning from their homes and drove them to a nearby police station. Within a short time, the guards in the actual experiment began treating them like any other criminal  (Zimbardo). They fingerprinted, photographed, and blindfolded them before driving them to prison rooms. The rooms have bare walls, small cells, barred doors, and windows. Within no time, every participant settles into his role. Secondly, both The Experiment and the actual exercise involves taunting of prisoners with insults, pointless tasks and dehumanizing actions. For example, in The Experiment movie, Barris leads a group of other guards to abduct, shave and urinate upon Travis, a hard-headed prisoner that plots a strike. In the actual Zimbardo’s experiment, prisoners were also humiliated to a point of starting to develop some mental disorders. Evidently, the two movies depict violence since participants go through emotional and psychological discomforts, stay in a poor environment, and are physically insulted. According to psychology, violence is an extreme form of aggression such as rape, murder or assault (Gerdes  142). It results from frustration, violence in homes, tendency to view other people’s behavior as hostile, and exposure to violent media. Psychologists also agree that some situations such as insults, drinking, provocations, drinking, and unsuitable environmental factors may also increase the risk of aggression. Sociologists define violence as harmful actions of people