What Can Social Psychology Teach Us About What Happened At...

What can social psychology teach us about what happened at Abu Ghraib? By Mandy Stead During the Iraq war that between 2003 and 2006, the united states army committed a series of human rights violations against prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison near Bagdad. The violations included murder, sexual and physical abuse, rape, torturer, sodomy, humiliating and dehumanizing prisoners. In 2004 the abuse that was carried out was exposed by the publication of images that were taken by the soldiers that carried out the violations. This paper will be looking at what social psychology can teach us about what happened at Abu Ghraib. The abuse took place in tier 1A on the night shift. The soldiers involved were all reserve soldiers who were not prepared or trained for this mission. They were asked to interrogate the detainees ‘take the gloves off’ to extract information out of them. The soldiers were pressured into crossing the line to gain information by the centre intelligence agency, tier 1A was known as the interrogation hold. One detained was mentally ill, he covered himself in faeces every day, the soldiers would have to role him in sand so he wouldn’t smell so bad and they named him ‘Shitboy’. What was he doing in an interrogation hold? This is one example that shows the level of humiliation and dehumanisation that went on. Philip Zimbardo was an expert witness for U.S. Army Reserve Staff Sgt. Ivan â€Å"Chip† Frederick, who was convicted of five charges of abusing prisoners, including