--- title: "Netflix Turns Horrific Social Experiment Into Reality TV Show" description: "Netflix has released a new series that recreates the premise of the controversial Stanford Prison experiment." date: "2026-10-29" modified: "2026-10-29" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore.md" url: "https://futurism.com/health-medicine/netflix-horrific-social-experiment" categories: - "Brain" - "Health & Medicine" - "Mental Health" --- # Netflix Turns Horrific Social Experiment Into Reality TV Show ![A screenshot of Netflix's "The New Stanford Prison Experiment."]() *Netflix* Netflix has recreated one of the most notorious and horrific social experiments in history: the Stanford prison experiment. The 1971 study has left an indelible legacy in psychology for perhaps all the wrong reasons. In it, Stanford University psychologist Philip Zimbardo had 24 male college students randomly assigned to play guards or inmates in a mock prison to see how power structures could affect the behavior of ordinary people. It was intended to last two weeks, but was shut down after just six days. From the very start, the students assigned as guards went on cruel power trips and repeatedly humiliated — if not psychologically tortured — the inmates, to the point that some of the prisoners suffered nervous breakdowns. The most infamous images show inmates forced to wear bags over their heads. Needless to say, the Stanford experiment [continues to be controversial]() for its dubious ethics and the equally dubious rigor of its methodology. Debates still rage over what conclusions, if any, to draw from such a deeply flawed but undeniably compelling study. Netflix's conclusion? That recreating the unsavory experiment would make for good television. The resulting six-part series, "The New Stanford Prison Experiment," is less abjectly horrifying but still a tough watch, [according to the *Washington Post*](). "Nobody ends up with a bag on his head," writes its critic Monica Hesse, and there's "no workplace sadism." But "what there is, again and again, are a minority of people who have come to an experiment about power and authority with apparently no set definition of power and authority." Hesse described it as "maddening" to watch people choose to be punitive instead of judicious when there's nothing forcing them to act that way. Her chagrin was deepened by the apparent pseudoscientific predilection of the experiment-runners, like the "psychologist who keeps introducing crazy variables and then murmuring, 'Interesting!' as if she stumbled upon the lunacy rather than planted it." It sounds, then, that Netflix's riff on the Stanford prison experiment is faithful to the original in that it's fatally flawed. Zimbardo admitted in his 2007 book "The Lucifer Effect" how he acted as the prison's "superintendent" and even coached the guards how to behave — details that critics say clearly compromise the objectivity of the study and biased it towards certain outcomes. There's probably little about human behavior that the Stanford experiment has left to tell us, but it still clearly captures our imaginations. **More on:** [*You’ll Never Guess Which Political Ideology People With Low Cognitive Ability Are Drawn Toward, According to New Research*]() ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]() ## More - [Something Grim Is Happening to Kids Who Got Cell Phones Early]() - [Woman Alarmed When Her Trusted Therapist Starts Recording Her With AI]() - [GLP-1 Drugs Linked to Cognitive Impairment, Though the Reason Why Probably Isn’t What You Expect]() - [Psychological Research Finds Trump Supporters Are Not Doing Well]() - [Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Says That Sacrificing Our Children’s Minds to AI Is a Price He’s Willing to Pay]() - [Trump’s Grip on Reality Questioned After He Shares and Then Deletes Bizarre AI-Generated Video]() - [DraftKings Is Using AI to Identify Problem Gamblers and Get Them Hooked]() - [The Things Young Kids Are Using AI for Are Absolutely Horrifying]()