Within days of Bashar al-Assad's fall, European countries including the UK, Ireland, Germany, France, Denmark, Sweden and Italy "paused the asylum process" for Syrian refugees, leaving them in limbo, said France 24. Austria's Interior Ministry has begun preparing a "return and deportation plan", said Politico. Yet the political situation in Syria remains extremely volatile, and for many refugees settled in Europe, it is "too soon" to consider going home.

'Impossible dream'
The rapid decisions to suspend asylum-claim decisions were clearly driven by European governments looking to "harden their stances on migration" in order to "quell surging support for populist and far-right forces", said Rob Picheta at CNN.

But countries hoping for a rapid exit of Syrians "are likely to be disappointed", said The Economist. The one million Syrians in Germany, for example, "have put down roots", and have an employment rate "higher than in most other EU countries".

The elation that Syrian refugees felt at the news of Assad's downfall has been punctured by the prospect of a forced return to their homeland. Many want to realise the once "impossible dream" of going back to Syria, said Clothilde Goujard at Politico, but they "harbour worries" about their country's future, and may "feel reluctant to leave the lives they've built over as much as a decade abroad".

'Major obstacles'
Any return of refugees will be "fraught with challenges",  said Will Todman of the US Center for Strategic and International Studies. But "rushing the return of millions" will put "even more pressure" on the "extremely fragile" situation in Syria.

A "successful transition" to peaceful democracy remains uncertain, and there are other "major obstacles" standing in the way of refugees who might return. Many will be reluctant to go back because of a "lack of jobs and basic services", while others simply do not have "homes to go back to".

It is "still too early to know" what will happen in Syria, said Le Monde, but it is in the "interest of all European countries" to ensure a stable government can form there. This is the "only way" that Syrian refugees can safely go home.

The Stanford Prison Experiment is one of the most famous – and infamous – psychological experiments ever conducted. But "everything you think you know about this study is wrong", filmmaker Juliette Eisner told Ars Technica. Eisner is the director of National Geographic's recent three-part series "The Stanford Prison Experiment: Unlocking the Truth", which investigates how the 1971 study was "riddled" with errors.

What was the Stanford Prison Experiment?
The 24 participants – all middle-class, male college students – had responded to an ad from Stanford psychology professor Philip Zimbardo seeking volunteers for "a psychological study of prison life". An advocate for prison reform, Zimbardo hoped to demonstrate that the prison environment encouraged dehumanisation and brutality.

The men were divided at random into "inmates" and "guards" and taken to a makeshift "prison" in the basement of the psychology building of Stanford University, in California, for what was supposed to be a two-week simulation.

How did it go?
"Things became dark almost immediately," said Time. "Guards" subjected "prisoners" to humiliating verbal and psychological abuse, including being made to strip naked, defecate in buckets and simulate sodomy. Several "inmates" quit the experiment early.

On day five, Zimbardo's then-girlfriend, Christina Maslach, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, visited the "prison". She was "so appalled" by what she saw that she convinced Zimbardo to end the experiment the next day.

Did it prove anything?
As well as being criticised for a lack of ethical oversight towards the well-being of participants, the experiment's methodology was also flawed from an academic standpoint. The "guards" received "extensive instruction" from Zimbardo and his colleagues on techniques to dehumanise their prisoners, said Time. Even so, only about a third of the "guards" actually displayed abusive behaviour, and several of those who did afterwards said they were simply trying to fulfil the role they believed they were being asked to play.

In 2002 recreation of the study for the BBC's "The Experiment", the "guards" were not coached on how to behave towards the inmates. This time, the "guards" did not abuse their authority and the "prisoners" eventually staged a revolt.

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It is not an abusive husband but France itself that is guilty
Judith Woods in The Telegraph
In the 1980s, the "wonderfully evocative" book "A Year in Provence" sparked Britain's "love affair" with the "sun-baked, lavender-scented" France of "fine food, vines and picture-perfect villages", writes Judith Woods. It's "taken just four months for an Avignon courtroom to irreparably smash that heavenly image to smithereens". "France itself" has "been in the dock" at the Pelicot trial: the country's "sexual mores", "egregious treatment of women" and "very integrity" have been subjected to "intense scrutiny" and "found wanting".

Where do you stand on 'I was sat'?
Ysenda Maxtone Graham in The Spectator
With a growing number of radio programmes being broadcast from the BBC's Salford HQ, the "whole of Britain" is getting used to hearing the expression "I was sat" or "I was stood", writes Ysenda Maxtone Graham. This "misuse of the passive voice" is an example of "northern creep", fuelled by "the current atmosphere at universities", where the "pressure is on" for students to "suppress their posh- or southern-sounding tendencies".

All the president's profits
Jill Filipovic in The New Statesman
Donald Trump has "hit the jackpot", writes Jill Filipovic. The US president-elect is "nothing if not wholly self-interested", and "retaking the White House" means "new opportunities for self-dealing and self-enrichment". In his first term, his companies made $160 million from foreign governments, and he'll soon have "unprecedented opportunities to maximise profits" again. Trump "seems willing and troublingly able" to "sell America out for cheap – as long as he enjoys the windfall".