The Zimbardo Prison Experiment was a study conducted at Stanford University in 1971 led by Prof. Philip Zimbardo. It was designed to observe the psychological effects of becoming a prisoner/prison guard on people. They gave 24 young males the roles of prisoners and prison guards in a mock prison and told them to act how they would in reality. The results of the experiment are pretty astounding:
The subjects adapted to their new roles much more than Zimbardo thought they would. The prison guards acted in a much more cruel way then expected, and the prisoners passively accepted the abuse. Some prisoners even went as far as to harass other prisoners when they refused to do the same. The prison guards completely tortured the prisoners psychologically, even though they were selected for the experiment as the most emotionally stable subjects available.
This connects to The Book of Negroes very closely. It reminds me of how Chekura was in charge of managing the slaves, even though he was a slave himself. I think the same effect happened to Chekura that happened to the prison guards. In a position of power and authority, they abused their power despite the fact that they're usually good people. The same can be said about the prisoners. In the experiment, the prisoners were impressionable and obedient when they were in a state of helplessness, even though they didn't agree with it.
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