//Conformity to social roles

Question 1

What does conformity to social roles involve

Answer 1

involves identification, which is stronger than complaince, involving public and private acceptance of the behaviour and attributes exhibited

Question 2

Why is conformity to social roles not as strong as internalisation

Answer 2

• because individuals adopt different social roles for different social situations and only conform to particular roles whilst in those particular social situation.
• with each social role adopted, behaviour changes to fit the social norms of the situation, if they move to another situation, their behaviour will change to fit the new social norms

Question 3

Zimbardo et al (1973) conforming to social roles aim

Answer 3

• to investigate the extent to which people would conform to the roles of guard and prisoner, in a mock prison
• to test the dispositional vs situational hypotheses that saw prison violence as either due to the sadistic personality of guards and prisoners, or the brutal conditions of the prison environment

Question 4

Zimbardo et al (1973) conforming to social roles procedure

Answer 4

• Male students were recruited to act as either guards or prisoners at Standford uni
• they were randomly given the roles of prisoner or guard, and their behaviour was observed
• the prisoners were ‘arrested’ as they went about their day, taken to ‘prison’ and given uniforms and numbers
• the guards wore uniforms and mirrorred sunglasses

Question 5

Zimbardo et al (1973) conforming to social roles findings

Answer 5

• initially the guards tried to assert their authority and the prisoners resisted by sticking together
• the prisoners then became more passive and obediant, while the guards invented nastier punishments
• the experiment was abandoned early because some prisoners became very distressed
• de-individuation was noticable as prisoners referred to each other as numbers

Question 6

Zimbardo et al (1973) conforming to social roles conclusion

Answer 6

• guards and prisoners adopted their social roles quickly
• Zimbardo claims this shows that our social role can influence our behaviour-seemingly well balanced men became unpleasant and aggressive in the role of guard

Question 7

Zimbardo et al (1973) conforming to social roles evaluation

Answer 7

• controlled observation-control of variables
• artifical situation-results can’t be generalised to real life
• some pps found it distressing
• Zimbardo ran the prison himself-later admitted that he became too personally involved in the situation
• the conclusion Zimbardo reached doesn’t explain why only some of the pps acted according to their assigned roles
• males were used-androcentric

Question 8

Zimbardo (1969) deindivinduation

Answer 8

• asked women to shock another woman
• deindivduation was produced in half of the pps by having them wear lab coats and hoods, that covered their faces
• intensity of electric shock given by those women who were twice as high as those who were treated like individuals

Question 9

Reicher and Haslam (2006)

Answer 9

• conducted a similar experiment to Zimbardo’s
• 5 guards+10 prisoners had undergone psychomteric testing/screening
• guards failed to identify with their role-prisoners increasingly did with their role
• guards overcome by prisoners