Zimbardo prison study

What study investigates conformity to social roles?

Conformity to social roles as investigated by Zimbardo

What was the aim of Zimbardo’s study?

the extent to which people conform to their given social roles

What was the procedure of Zimbardo’s study?

Procedure: In order to test this he created a fake prison in the basement of Stanford university. 21 male students rated as the most physically and mentally stable were selected from 75 volunteers who responded to the newspaper advert. They were randomly allocated such that 10 were assigned to be guards, and 11 were assigned to be prisoners.

What happened to the prisoners in Zimbardo’s study?

The prisoners were given a realistic arrest at their homes by local police, so were fingerprinted, stripped, and deloused. They were given a basic prison uniform and an identification number in an attempt to dehumanise them. They had to follow strict rules during the day.

What happened to the guards in Zimbardo’s study?

Guards worked in 8 hour shifts in groups of three. They had complete control and were given uniforms, clubs, handcuffs, and mirrored sunglasses to prevent eye contact between prisoner and guards.

What were the findings of Zimbardo’s study?

Findings: Prisoners and guards quickly began conforming to their social roles. By two days the prisoner revolted against their poor treatment by the guards and by six days the rest of the two week experiment was cancelled early due to fears for prisoner mental health.

What was the conclusion of Zimbardo’s study?

Conclusion: Participants in the experiment conformed to their social roles within the prison, showing the situational power of the prison environment to change behaviour.

What is a limitation of Zimbardo’s study in terms of generalisability?

Generalisability- There could be cultural/temporal differences in the way guards and prisoner are perceived, as Zimbardo’s sample were Americans in the 1970s and Reichler and Haslam’s sample were English people in the 2010s. Modern English people may perceive the role of a prisoner to be aggressive and disorderly, and a guard to be calm and controlled, whereas the Americans may expect a prisoner to be fearful and obedient, and a guard to be an authoritarian disciplinarian. Therefore this would suggest that whilst both may be valid examples of participants internalising their roles, the procedure and hypotheses may have to be adjusted for different cultures and eras so as to produce reliable results.

What is a limitation of Zimbardo’s study in terms of reliability?

Reliability- Reichler and Haslam (2011) tried to recreate the Stanford Prison study in a programme for the BBC. However in this simulation prisoners became dominant over the guards and became disobedient to the guards who were unable to control their behaviour.

What does Reichler and Haslam’s study suggest?

This suggests that the results of Zimbardo’s study may be down to individual differences. The reason his guards had such control over the prisoners was perhaps because all or most of those randomly assigned to be guards were those with more dominant personalities, and all or most of the prisoners had more submissive/agreeable personalities.

What is a limitation of Zimbardo’s study in terms of application?

Application- Zimbardo’s study can be seen as a failure as despite his findings, as American prisons remain places of excessive violence on the part of both prisoner and guards, so situational factors continue to affect prisoner behaviour.

What is a limitation of Zimbardo’s study in terms of validity?

Validity- Zimbardo used his study to argue that the prison situation causes guards to become aggressive, however only ⅓ of the guards were excessively aggressive. ⅓ stayed neutral and another ⅓ actually tried to help the prisoners by relaxing rules and giving out cigarettes. It is thought that prisoner and guards may have been acting according to stereotypes rather than conforming to social roles, imitating depictions of prisoner and guards that they had seen in the media, such as a prison film at the time called Cool Hand Luke, showing controlling and aggressive guards, so study may lack internal validity.

What are the ethical issues with Zimbardo’s study?

Ethics- The study was unethical as participants were exposed to psychological harm. This harm could not have been predicted at the outset, but the experiment should have been stopped as soon as it was clear that prisoners were distressed (i.e: on day 2) rather than being allowed to carry on.