Conformity to social roles Flashcards
1
Q
social roles
A
- Social roles are the behaviours expected of an individual who occupies a social position or status
- People can conform to the social roles assigned to them
2
Q
Zimbardo’s experiment - procedure
A
3
Q
Zimbardo’s experiment - findings
A
4
Q
disads of ZImbardo’s experiment
A
- highly unethical
- invalid study
- unrepresentative sample
- demand characteristics
- individual differences
5
Q
highly unethical - disads of ZImbardo’s experiment
A
- study was highly unethical as the prisoners were subjected to psychological harm
- 5 prisoners had to be released early due to extreme reactions e.g. crying, rage + acute anxiety
- HOWEVER Zimbardo didn’t expect the guards to behave in the way they did so this harm couldn’t have been anticipated
6
Q
invalid study - disads of ZImbardo’s experiment
A
- Zimbardo took on the role of the prison warden
= became very involved + lost objectivity - he had to be told by a colleague to end the experiment of concerns over the distress of the prisoners
= question the validity of the findings
7
Q
unrepresentative sample - disads of ZImbardo’s experiment
A
- sample was unrepresentative = all white American male students
= gender + cultural bias
= can’t generalise to other genders or cultures
8
Q
demand characteristics - disads of ZImbardo’s experiment
A
- the guards in Z’s experiment may have behaved the way they did due to demand characteristics
- some parts reported afterwards that they thought the experimenters wanted them to behave aggressively, so that’s why they behaved the way they did
= STUDY IS INVALID
9
Q
individual differences - disads of Zimbardo’s experiment
A
some of the guards didn’t conform to the role given to them
= very reluctant to became involved in cruelty towards the prisoners whereas other guards were very abusive
- suggests that individual differences are important in determining the extent to which parts will conform to social roles
