Conformity to Social Roles Flashcards
What are three AO3 points to evaluate conformity to social roles?
- high control over extraneous variables
- ethical issues
- demand characteristics
P
(high control over extraneous variables)
strength - high control over extraneous variables
E
e.g. the way in which ppts were selected as researchers assessed the emotional stability of ppts prior to exp and then randomly allocated them to prisoner/guard
E
if guards/prisoners acted very diff in their roles, bhv must be due to the role itself. this allowed zimbardo to accurately measure power of social roles on conf rather than it being affected by indv diff
L
therefore this inc int val
P
(ethical issues)
However a weakness - major ethical issues of lack of informed consent
E
this is coz prisoners didnt consent to being arrested at homes, they were only told they were taking part in an exp inv prison life.
E
another ethical issue was that prisoners were not protected from harm as some showed psychological disturbance
L
- therefore some may argue this reduces the credibility of Zimbardos research into conf to social roles
DISCUSSION
- HOWEVER, zimbardo carried out debriefing sessions with ppts for years after exp + concluded there were no long term neg effects.
- He also concluded that the benefits to und social roles on human bhv outweights the minor cost of ethical issues on ppts as research has been used to improve training for prison env
P
(demand characteristics)
A further weakness - prone to demand characteristics
E
coz zimbardo took on role of superintendent within his own exp possibly influencing how ppts acted in the study as they were paid to take part in exp
E
Or they may have conformed to social role as they believed its what zimbardo wanted rather than actually conforming to social roles of prisoner/guard
L
therefore lowering int val
