The sociology experiment that Logan (Jason Dohring) & Wallace participate in is modeled after the infamous Stanford prison experiment, although in the original, the experiment got a lot more out of hand and was suspended after just six days.
The county Keith (Enrico Colantoni) finds after walking through the desert is called Kretchmer County. It is named after John T. Kretchmer, the director of this episode as well as many previous episodes
Dan Castellaneta plays a professor named Dr. Kinny in this episode. In one scene he gives another character a dressing down to which that character exclaims, D'oh!" This is the catch phrase of Castellaneta's best-known character, Homer Simpson from The Simpsons (1989).
Writer Phil Klemmer was the writer who originally wanted to use the Stanford Prison Experiment in an episode, but the episode ended up going to Diane Ruggiero-Wright.
While the experiment conducted in this episode by the sociology professor is inspired by famous Stanford Prison Experiment, this type of experiment has been illegal for university settings for quiet some time, so it couldn't really be replicated anymore (or at the time of this episode's airing) legally.