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Tanya Paolillo

SPE and Validity - Tanya Paolillo

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Research experiments serve a critical role in predicting behavior by carefully analyzing findings related to the area of interest or research question. One important component of good research is having the ability to confirm its validity and reliability. Validity refers to how accurate the study is. There are several methods that can identify validity: construct, internal, external, and statistical (Jhangiani, 2019). In theory, this should increase the chance to deem a study as high in validity, as there are four possible areas that can help support the study itself, if conducted and planned accurately.

One example of a research experiment is the Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE). In basic terms, the SPE was intended to focus on dehumanizing and humiliating behavior, conditions leading to participant responses to such subjection under not-so-obvious terms (Le Texier, 2019). This study was described to volunteers as an experiment determining prison behaviors without the details of what exactly was to come.

Internal validity's goal is to identify two variables with a proven causal relationship (Jhangiani, 2019). The independent variable can be either 1-a person subjected to prison life; or 2-a person subjected to rebellion by prisoners or adverse treatment by guards. Reliability, on the other hand, is a causal relationship between two variables that can be repeatedly confirmed through numerous, additional studies. It is unlikely reliability exists for the SPE, as the same results are unlikely to occur again, given the already many implications to the original study.

Many factors lead to discrediting the SPE study and deeming it as lacking the internal or external validity necessary for a good research study. The SPE did not prove exposure to prison life definitively caused the once-believed-to-be-erratic-behavior by participants, or ethical responses to prisoners by guards. External validity, on the other hand, will provide support to generalizing results based on the study's outcome. Related to external validity is mundane realism, which refers to studies of the same magnitude that will enable generalizing results. The prisoners' responses to the experiment were not, in fact, erratic behavior, but another half-truth told to participants: both guards and prisoners alike (Le Texier, 2019).

I believe mundane realism is absent from this study as the original study lacks external validity. Furthermore, the SPE clearly lacks construct validity as the quality of the manipulations are lacking: the Right to Consent appears to be incomplete as important details were omitted from both the instructions/background provided to true volunteers (prisoners) and the guards. Harsh punishments were forced on many of the prisoners, especially those who questioned authority figures (Le Texier, 2019). These two factors alone suggest levels of internal or external validity, as well as potential biases to the study. Had a manipulation check been added to the process, many of the flaws within the original SPE may have been eliminated before the study's inception. With that stated, a manipulation check typically occurs after the experiment is complete, so some flaws and compromising-to-validity-features may not be possible to avoid. This study cannot be justified in generalizing results, as the study in its current form is faulty on various levels. Any product of the study will be very questionable, at best.

References

Jhangiani, R.S., Chiang, I.C.A., Cuttler, C., & Leighton, D.C. (2019). Research Methods in Psychology (4^th edition). Saylor Foundation (via Open Textbook Library).

Le Texier. (2019). Debunking the Stanford Prison Experiment.The American Psychologist,74(7), 823-839. https://doi.org/10.1037/amp0000401