Conformity To Social Roles As Investigated By Zimbardo Flashcards
Social roles definition
the ‘parts’ people play as members of various social groups. Everyday examples include parent, child, student, passenger etc. These are accompanied by expectations we and others have of what is appropriate behaviour in each role, for example, caring, obedient, industrious
What was the SPE experiment
The Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE)– Zimbardo et al (1974)
Zimbardo (1973) was interested in finding out whether the brutality reported among guards in American prisons was due to the sadistic personalities of the guards (i.e., dispositional) or had more to do with the prison environment (i.e., situational).
For example, prisoner and guards may have personalities which make conflict inevitable, with prisoners lacking respect for law and order and guards being domineering and aggressive. Alternatively, prisoners and guards may behave in a hostile manner due to the rigid power structure of the social environment in prisons.
If the prisoners and guards behaved in a non-aggressive manner, this would support the dispositional hypothesis, or if they behave the same way as people do in real prisons, this would support the situational explanation.
SPE aim
To see whether people will conform to new social roles. In other words, to investigate how readily people would conform to the roles of guard and prisoner in a role-playing exercise that simulated prison life.
SPE method
To study the roles people play in prison situations, Zimbardo converted a basement of the Stanford University psychology building into a mock prison. He advertised asking for volunteers to participate in a study of the psychological effects of prison life,
More than 70 applicants answered the ad and were given diagnostic interviews and personality tests to eliminate candidates with psychological problems, medical disabilities, or a history of crime or drug abuse.
The study comprised 24 male college students (chosen from 75 volunteers) who were paid $15 per day to take part in the experiment.
Participants were randomly assigned to either the role of prisoner or guard in a simulated prison environment. There were two reserves, and one dropped out, finally leaving ten prisoners and 11 guards.
The guards worked in sets of three (being replaced after an 8-hour shift), and the prisoners were housed three to a room. There was also a solitary confinement cell for prisoners who ‘misbehaved.’ The prison simulation was kept as “real life” as possible.
Prisoners were treated like every other criminal, being arrested at their own homes, without warning, and taken to the local police station. They were fingerprinted, photographed and ‘booked.’
Then they were blindfolded and driven to the psychology department of Stanford University, where Zimbardo had had the basement set out as a prison, with barred doors and windows, bare walls and small cells. Here the deindividuation process began.
When the prisoners arrived at the prison they were stripped naked, deloused, had all their personal possessions removed and locked away, and were given prison clothes and bedding. They were issued a uniform, and referred to by their number only.
The use of ID numbers was a way to make prisoners feel anonymous. Each prisoner had to be called only by his ID number and could only refer to himself and the other prisoners by number.
Their clothes comprised a smock with their number written on it, but no underclothes. They also had a tight nylon cap to cover their hair, and a locked chain around one ankle
All guards were dressed in identical uniforms of khaki, and they carried a whistle around their neck and a billy club borrowed from the police. Guards also wore special sunglasses, to make eye contact with prisoners impossible.
Three guards worked shifts of eight hours each (the other guards remained on call). Guards were instructed to do whatever they thought was necessary to maintain law and order in the prison and to command the respect of the prisoners. No physical violence was permitted.
Zimbardo observed the behaviour of the prisoners and guards (as a researcher), and also acted as a prison warden or superintendent.
SPE results
Within a very short time both guards and prisoners were settling into their new roles, with the guards adopting theirs quickly and easily. Within hours of beginning the experiment some guards began to harass prisoners. They behaved in a brutal and sadistic manner, apparently enjoying it. Other guards joined in, and other prisoners were also tormented.
The prisoners were taunted with insults and petty orders, they were given pointless and boring tasks to accomplish, and they were generally dehumanized.
The prisoners soon adopted prisoner-like behaviour too. They talked about prison issues a great deal of the time. They ‘told tales’ on each other to the guards. They started taking the prison rules very seriously, as though they were there for the prisoners’ benefit and infringement would spell disaster for all of them. Some even began siding with the guards against prisoners who did not obey the rules.
Over the next few days the relationships between the guards and the prisoners changed, with a change in one leading to a change in the other. Remember that the guards were firmly in control and the prisoners were totally dependent on them.
As the prisoners became more dependent, the guards became more derisive towards them. They held the prisoners in contempt and let the prisoners know it. As the guards’ contempt for them grew, the prisoners became more submissive.
As the prisoners became more submissive, the guards became more aggressive and assertive. They demanded even greater obedience from the prisoners. The prisoners were dependent on the guards for everything so tried to find ways to please the guards, such as telling tales on fellow prisoners.
One prisoner had to be released after 36 hours because of uncontrollable bursts of screaming, crying and anger. His thinking became disorganized and he appeared to be entering the early stages of a deep depression. Within the next few days three others also had to leave after showing signs of emotional disorder that could have had lasting consequences. (These were people who had been pronounced stable and normal a short while before).
Zimbardo (1973) had intended that the experiment should run for a fortnight, but on the sixth day it was terminated. Christina Maslach, a recent Stanford Ph.D. brought in to conduct interviews with the guards and prisoners, strongly objected when she saw the prisoners being abused by the guards. Filled with outrage, she said, “It’s terrible what you are doing to these boys!” Out of 50 or more outsiders who had seen our prison, she was the only one who ever questioned its morality.
SPE conclusion
Zimbardo concluded that people quickly conform to social roles, even when the role goes against their moral principles. Furthermore, he concluded that situational factors were largely responsible for the behaviour found, as none of the participants had ever demonstrated these behaviours previously.
Strengths of SPE study
Good level of control over variables
One of the main strengths of the SPE study is that Zimbardo and his colleagues had some level of control over variables e.g. when selecting participants, Zimbardo and his team chose the most emotionally stable males. Furthermore, each participant was randomly assigned to either prisoner or guard meaning that there was no experimenter bias. It also meant that if the guards and prisoners behaved very differently but were in those roles through chance, then their behaviour had to be due to the pressures of the situation rather than their own individual personalities. As this study did have high control over lots of variables it increases the internal validity of the study meaning that we can be more confident in drawing conclusions about conforming to social roles.
The SPE and its relevance to Abu Ghraib – therefore the experiment has good application
Abu Ghraib
From 2003-2004 USA Military Police committed serious human rights violations against Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad.
Zimbardo argues that the same conformity to social role effect that was evident in the SPE was also present in Abu Ghraib, a military prison in Iraq notorious for the torture and abuse of Iraqi prisoners by US soldiers in 2003-4. Zimbardo believed that the guards who abused the prisoners were actually victims of the situational factors at that time. Zimbardo suggests that lack of training, unrelenting boredom and no accountability to higher authorities were present in the SPE and Abu Ghraib. These combined with an opportunity to misuse the power associated with being a ‘guard’ led to the prisoner abuses in both situations.
Weakness of SPE
Lack of research support
One of the main weaknesses of the SPE is the lack of research support. For instance Reicher and Haslam (2006) in their partial replication of the Stanford prison experiment was broadcast on BBC TV, so has become known as the BBC Prison Study. Their findings were very different to those of Zimbardo and his colleagues. It was the prisoners who eventually took control of the mock prison and subjected the guards to a campaign of harassment and disobedience. The researchers used Social Identity Theory (SIT Tajfel 1981) to explain this outcome. They argued that the guards had failed to develop a shared identity as a cohesive group, but the prisoners did. They actively identified themselves as members of a social group that refused to accept the limits of their assigned role as prisoners.
Ethical issues
A major ethical issue arose because of Zimbardo’s dual roles in the study. For example, on one occasion a student who wanted to leave the study spoke to Zimbardo in his role as a superintendent. The whole conversation was conducted on the basis that the student was a prisoner in a prison, asking to be ‘released’. Zimbardo responded to him as a superintendent worried about the running of his prison rather than as a researcher with responsibility towards his participants.
Another ethical issue is the deception used or lack of informed consent of the ‘prisoners’ as they did not know that they would be arrested in their own homes – the psychological distress caused by this would have scarred the prisoners quite a bit. Although, Extensive group and individual debriefing sessions were held and all participants returned post-experimental questionnaires several weeks, then several months later, then at yearly intervals. Zimbardo also strongly argues that the benefits gained about our understanding of human behaviour and how we can improve society should out balance the distress caused by the study
How did zimbardo explain ethical issues of his expt
The only deception involved was to do with the arrest of the prisoners at the beginning of the experiment. The prisoners were not told partly because final approval from the police wasn’t given until minutes before the participants decided to participate, and partly because the researchers wanted the arrests to come as a surprise. However this was a breach of the ethics of Zimbardo’s own contract that all of the participants had signed.
When Zimbardo realised just how much the prisoners disliked the experience, which was unexpected, the experiment was abandoned.
Approval for the study was given from the Office of Naval Research, the Psychology Department and the University Committee of Human Experimentation. This Committee also did not anticipate the prisoners’ extreme reactions that were to follow.
Alternative methodologies were looked at which would cause less distress to the participants but at the same time give the desired information, but nothing suitable could be found.
Extensive group and individual debriefing sessions were held and all participants returned post-experimental questionnaires several weeks, then several months later, then at yearly intervals
Zimbardo also strongly argues that the benefits gained about our understanding of human behaviour and how we can improve society should out balance the distress caused by the study. However it has been suggested that the US Navy was not so much interested in making prisons more human and were in fact more interested in using the study to train people in the armed services to cope with the stresses of captivity.
