Conformity to Social Roles - Zimbardo's Research

Question 1

Outline Zimbardo’s research into conformity

Answer 1

• Aim: To investigate whether people would conform to their social roles or not
• Method: 24 male volunteers from advertisement in local newspaper, controlled observation, participants randomly assigned roles (guard or prisoner)
• Procedure: “Prisoners” arrested from their homes in the middle of the night (and were not aware this was going to happen) then given prisoner uniform and ID number (were only referred to by this number). “Guards” given shift patterns and had uniforms, handcuffs, wooden club (but could not use physical violence) and keys; also had full control over prisoners’ routines. Guards often made prisoners do humiliating tasks by ordering them around even if they hadn’t done anything wrong.
• Results: For the first 2 days prisoners rebelled, but quickly became depressed and anxious and gave in (5 prisoners had to be released early on medical grounds). Guards became aggressive and enjoyed their power. Planned to run for 2 weeks but terminated after 6 days when a Zimbardo realised how inhumane he had become and engrossed in his role as prison superintendent rather than a psychologist.
• Conclusion: People conform to social roles even if it goes against their moral principles. Situational factors are largely responsible.

Question 2

What are two strengths of Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison study?

Answer 2

P: High internal validity
Ev: Zimbardo had high control over extraneous variables, for example only mentally stable participants took place
Ex: Suggests Zimbardo tried to eliminate individual differences which would have otherwise affected the extent to which participants conform, this also ensured behaviour would be due to the situation they were in (situational factors) and not their personality (dispositional factors)
L: Therefore Zimbardo’s research has high internal validity so his conclusions can be trusted

P: Real world application
Ev: Zimbardo’s research can be used to explain abuses of power in real world prison situations, Abu Ghraib was a military prison in Iraq notorious for the torture and abuse of Iraqi prisoners by US soldiers in 2003 and 2004
Ex: Suggests situational factors as well as the opportunity to misuse power associated with the role (guard) led to the prisoners’ abuse in both Zimbardo’s study and in Abu Ghraib
L: Therefore we must consider Zimbardo’s research when training future prison guards and other members of society in roles of authority

Question 3

What are two limitations of Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison study?

Answer 3

P: Potential demand characteristics
Ev: Banuazizi and Movahedi argue the behaviour of the participants was just acting as they presented some of the details of the procedure to students and they correctly guessed the aim and correctly predicted how the guards would act (hostile and aggressive)
Ex: This suggests demand characteristics are the real reason for the participants’ behaviour therefore Zimbardo’s research may lack internal validity due to its lack of realism
CA: HOWEVER ZImbardo’s quantitative data shows that 90% of conversations participants had were related to ‘prison life’ which suggests the situation felt real to the participants

P: Ethical issues
Ev: Study was approved by Stanford ethics committee but still has issues, Zimbardo completely disregarded participants’ right to withdraw because he became so engrossed in his role as superintendent
Ex: He acknowledges that the study should have been stopped earlier as it was causing participants emotional distress and attempted to makes amends for this by carrying out debriefing sessions and years later found no lasting negative effects
L: Therefore although the findings and conclusions are valid, his ethics were questionable