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The Lucifer Effect
Varnish was lowest on Empathy and Trustworthiness but highest on concern for
neatness and orderliness. He also had the highest Machiavellian score of any
guard. Packaged together, that syndrome characterizes the coolly efficient, me-
chanical, and detached behavior he showed throughout the study.
While these findings suggest that personality measures do predict behavioral
differences in some individual cases, we need to be cautious in overgeneralizing
their utility in understanding individual behavior patterns in novel settings, such
as this one. For example, based on all the measures we examined, Jerry-5486 was
the most "supranormal" of the prisoners. However, second in line with person-
ality inventory scores that would qualify him as "most normal" is Doug-8612.
His disturbed account of acting and then becoming "crazy" was hardly pre-
dictable from his "most normal" pre-experimental status. Moreover, we could find
no personality precursors for the difference between the four meanest guards and
the others who were less abusive. Not a single personality predisposition could ac-
count for this extreme behavioral variation.
Now if we look at the personality scores of the two guards who were clearly
the meanest and most sadistic toward prisoners, Hellmann and Arnett, both
turned out to be ordinary, average on all but one of the personality dimensions.
Where they diverged was on Masculinity. An intuitive personality theorist would
seem justified in assuming that Hellmann, our badass "John Wayne," would top
off the scale on Masculinity. Just the opposite was true: he scored lower on Mas-
culinity than any other guard and, for that matter, lower than any prisoner did. In
contrast, Arnett scored as the most masculine of all the guards. Psychodynamic
analysts would most certainly assume that Hellmann's cruel, dominating behav-
ior and his invention of homophobic exercises were motivated by a reaction for-
mation against his nonmasculine, possibly latent-homosexual nature. However,
before we wax analytically lyrical, I must hasten to add that there has been noth-
ing in his subsequent lifestyle over the past thirty-five years that has character-
ized this young man as anything but appropriate and normal as a husband,
father, businessman, and civic-minded citizen.
Mood Adjective Self-Reports. Twice during the study and immediately after the de-
briefing session, each of the students completed a checklist of adjectives that they
felt best described their current mood state. We combined the mood adjectives
into those that reflected negative versus positive moods and separately those that
portrayed activity versus passivity. As might well be expected from all we have
seen of the state of the prisoners, the prisoners expressed three times as much
negative affect as positive and much more negativity overall than did the guards.
The guards expressed slightly more negative than positive affect. Another inter-
esting difference between the two groups is the greater fluctuation in the prison-
ers' mood states. Over the course of the study, they showed two to three times as
much variation in their moods as did the relatively stable guards. On the dimen-
sion of activity-passivity, the prisoners tended to score twice as high, indicating
The SPE's Meaning and Messages
201
twice as much internal "agitation" as the guards. While the prison experience
had a negative emotional impact upon both guards and prisoners, the adverse ef-
fects upon the prisoners were more profound and unstable.
Comparing the prisoners who stayed to those who were released early, the
mood of those who had to be terminated was marked by a decidedly more nega-
tive tone: depression and unhappiness. When the mood scales were administered
for a third time, just after the subjects were told that the study had been termi-
nated (the early-released subjects returned for the debriefing encounter session),
elevated changes in positive moods were evident. All of the now "ex-convicts" se-
lected self-descriptive adjectives that characterized their mood as less negative
and much more positive—a decrease in negativity from the initially strong 15.0
to a low of 5.0, while their positivity soared from the initial low of 6.0 up to 17.0.
In addition, they now felt less passive than before.
In general, there were no longer any differences on these mood subscales be-
tween prisoners released early and those who endured the six days. I am happy to
be able to report the vital conclusion that by the end of the study both groups of
students had returned to their pre-experiment baselines of normal emotional re-
sponding. This return to normality seems to reflect the "situational specificity" of
the depression and stress reactions these students experienced while playing their
unusual roles.
This last finding can be interpreted in several ways. The emotional impact of
the prison experience was transient since the suffering prisoners quickly bounced
back to a normal mood base level as soon as the study was terminated. It also
speaks to the "normality" of the participants we had so carefully selected, and
this bounce-back attests to their resilience. However, the same overall reaction
among the prisoners could have come from very different sources. Those who re-
mained were elated by their newfound freedom and the knowledge that they had
survived the ordeal. Those who were released early were no longer emotionally
distressed, having readjusted while away from the negative situation. Perhaps we
can also attribute some of their newly positive reactions to gratification at seeing
their fellow prisoners released, thus relieving them of the burden of guilt they
may have felt for leaving early while their fellows had to stay on, enduring the or-
deal.
Although some guards indicated that they wished the study had continued
as planned for another week, as a group they too were glad to see it end. Their
mean positivity score more than doubled (from 4.0 to 10.2), and their low nega-
tivity score (6.0) got even lower (2.0). Therefore, as a group, they also were able to
regain their emotional composure and balance despite their role in creating the
horrible conditions in this prison setting. This mood readjustment does not mean
that some of these young men were not troubled by what they had done and by
their failure to stop abuse, as we noted earlier in their postexperiment reactions
and retrospective diaries.
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