social influence

What was an unethical about zimbardos experiment ?

Participants were psychologically harmed during experiment

Participants didn’t know what they were consenting to and so could not give informed consent.

What was the response to criticism of the experiment being unethical ?

Lack of awareness- he had recruited psychologically healthy people and stopped the experiment before it got worse

Criticisms of zimbardos experiment

Unethical - no informed consent from participants, people were psychologically harmed during experiment.

Lack of generalisability- findings can’t be generalised to all cultures as the sample was white men.

Lack of ecological validity- participants may of realised the aim of the experiment and didn’t take it seriously causing demand characteristics.

Investigator effects- zimbardo played the role of prison warden in his own experiment. This may have biased the sample. He may have influenced the behaviour of his participants

What is a response to the criticism that zimbardo’s study might lack ecological validity is..

90% of participants conversations during the experiment were about life in prison, suggesting they were taking it seriously.

Response to criticism that zimbardos experiment lacked generalisability

That his experiment successfully explained some real world examples of brutality.

What type of study was zimbardos prison experiment

An overt, controlled observation

What did zimbardo conclude that prison violence is caused by ?

People conforming via identification

What were zimbardos responses to the criticisms his study faced ?

• he claimed his study was generalisable because the results could explain real world violence

• He claimed his study was not unethical because participants were screened to ensure they were psychologically healthy

• He could not argue with the investigator effects criticism

• He claimed the study had ecological validity because participants did act as if it was real - they became distressed and 90% of conversations were about prison life

• He claimed it was not unethical because he himself did not know it was going to become so violent and ended it once it did.

What are the situational variables that affect conformity

Group size, Unamity, task difficulty

What are the explanations for conformity?

Normative social influence- want to be liked and accepted, avoiding rejection, doing things to make people like them, to fit in.

Informational social influence- uncertainty, so conform when people are unsure and believe the majority is probably right

What are people usually conforming